William Ryan Key Band • Page 10

Also even tho I think he’s a douche and deserves to be knocked down a few pegs for his inflated ego (ie: realize he’s not the main attraction) I still do genuinely hope he finds success/happiness/whatever, whether that’s in producing music or what. I just don’t think he has what it takes to be a solo musician or, frankly, a musician that interfaces with the public at all.

 

I've read about him being a jerk to fans and ignoring them especially during the peak of their popularity. Do you have any first hand experiences? In terms of interviews and the way he communicates with fans online I've always thought of him as a cool guy. He even signed the EPs I bought from his webstore which was neat.

 

I don’t really feel like typing it all out I mean there’s a TON. I just said one of the things I’m basing my opinion on is first hand experiences and things I witnessed with my own eyes.
To start, he told someone in the crowd he was going to attack them (I believe it was a her but I’m not positive) (bash your face in? Punch you in the face? I don’t remember exact words) if they didn’t “put their fucking phone away” so
I am comfortable saying that one because it happened publicly on mic in front of the whole crowd. I was appalled.


Also I mean it’s kinda sad to me that you see his interactions as being a cool guy. Sometimes he’s cool but he loses his cool easily. Two times that come to mind are during a reddit AMA and fighting with fans in the comments of a yellowcard Facebook post about the songs they were playing on the MMF tour. Which coincidentally is the same tour the above story happened at.

also also not to be a jerk but him signing the cd wasn’t to be nice it was just bc of the aforementioned inflated ego.

 

He was a pretty infamous asshole on the old YCMB too from what I can remember but that was like 15+ years ago probably....lol

...thinking more about this a lot of that might have been directed at that crew of people that openly disliked and talked shit about Yellowcard for “selling out” but stuck around their message board for some reason.. so maybe some of it was justified..idk.

 

Ok point taken.

I figured you'd point that out about the signed CD but I still like it

 

His reasoning doesn’t take away from the significance and importance to you!

 

You don’t remember the reddit AMA? Lol
He was a dick there too and while part of it was the fact that he was responding to trolls, it’s also like it’s reddit why are you responding to the trolls instead of the actual people asking questions

I think he justifies it sometimes by saying that’s how he responds to “jerks” and stuff but to me it’s just a bad look.

 

I think there's more things from his first solo tour that were posted maybe in this thread, that he actually acknowledge and apolgized for after

 

I never got the impression that he thought he was the most important part of Yellowcard, but I have had the thought that both he and YC as a whole kind of overestimated their fame when they broke up

 

He had been professionally known as Ryan Key, and I found it odd he tried to go full name for a new project with William Ryan Key. Maybe he wanted to sound more mature or that William had always been his preference. He also abandoned Will and The Whiskeymen name so quickly.

 

I’m sure there will be a 20th anniversary of Ocean Avenue tour or something at some point.

 

I can almost guarantee you the band will not be doing anything like that, based on conversations with the band and plenty of interviews since I last spoke to them. It ain’t happening.

 

I personally love his solo work and was very excited about the direction it was going in. I didn't realize he expected to be successful making this style of music. It wasn't apparent that not all YC fans will latch onto something so different? But then again... the last time I saw him was a free concert at a suburban park and it was a small crowd from what I can remember. I could not have predicted that.

I know why this project didn't take off, but man, I am bummed that he gave up on it.

 

Wish we got one full length with some sort of label backing or Kickstarter specific fan funding.

 

Same. Kickstarter would have been a smart way to justify if it was worth putting out!

 

I think people should prepare themselves for a lot of bands and smaller acts to not make it through this COVID era. It’s going to decimate small and medium sized artists. If they can’t tour, they are insolvent.

 

Without any bailout-type funding for artists on a substantial level, it's going to be really grim. And let's be honest, the likelihood of anything coming from the government to help is below zero

 

You think this will hurt NFG and Simple Plan a lot?

 

The question is - what defines a s/m sized artist? A band on their own label like Manchester? Newer solo artists like Soccer Mommy? Bands that released an album during the cycle and can't tour like The Used?

 

Both of those bands seem relatively well suited, plus have made a lot of money already, to be able to stick it out. But not being able to tour on the upcoming album is most certainly why they are postponing their album.

Well, we know Man Orch is doing all they can to try and stay afloat (Patreon) at the moment. Artists like Soccer Mommy are probably struggling quite a bit right now. What other sources of income they have is probably what's keeping them afloat. The Used not being able to tour (especially with what they had lined up) has to hurt them quite a bit. I'd venture the guess that most legacy acts have more runway if they've been smart with finances and saving and a catalog doing something on streaming services; so newer acts are probably in more trouble from that angle.

 

I don’t this situation is what impacted WRK from continuing this project right now though.

 

I wanna know more.

Just finished compiling a massive playlist of all Yellowcard/Ryan Key and Over It music. Figured I wouldn’t be adding any more songs, and all of a sudden two days later I see this.

Really hope Ryan keeps the music thing going to some degree.

 

Ryan announced he’s scoring a feature film with Ryan Mendez. Also:

 

Ryan announced on his Instagram today that he’s starting a Patreon next week offering new music each month, live acoustic sets, handwritten lyrics, etc.