Ryan Adams at the O2 Apollo, Manchester, review: An effortless, career-spanning masterclass

After being spotted at Manchester’s famed Johnny Roadhouse in January – the shop where Oasis and The Smiths bought their guitars – rumours grew that Ryan Adams was about to play a surprise gig in the city.

Sure enough, Adams arrived at a tiny venue in the bohemian Northern Quarter of Manchester to play his new album Prisoner ahead of release. “My favourite bands come from here,” he told the audience of 200, adding: “You gave me s**t when I sucked, and I deserved it.”

Adams is back in Manchester tonight, this time playing to a considerably larger, sold-out audience of 3500. The stage is an Eighties throwback, all huge retro TVs and fake stuffed animals that have all the grandiose absurdity of something from a Duran Duran video or Dynasty.

It proves a fitting setting as Adams roars out opener “Do You Still Love Me?” from Prisoner, an excellent Eighties power-ballad pastiche. Like all of Adams’s best albums, his newest is full of heartbreak as he chronicles his painful marriage breakdown to actress Mandy Moore.

Channelling the Eighties again, an excellent run of new songs – the glorious “Outbound Train”, brooding “Doomsday” and title track “Prisoner” – are all played with the energy and spirit of Nebraska-era Springsteen. Whilst these songs might be suggestive of the more subdued introversion characteristic of Adams’s early career, the rest of the mammoth 26-song set revisits the heavier, bluesier side of his hit-laden catalogue.

Adams also takes time to build a warm intimacy with his audience tonight, something that hasn’t always proven easy for the 42-year-old.

“This is as fun as sad music will ever be,” he jokes before “Everybody Knows”. “I think the ending is shockingly overproduced and you’re going to love it,” he comically says, building up “I Just Might” before a commotion of exaggerated guitar strumming bursts into action.

The gentle “When the Stars Go Blue” is stunning in delivery, as is set closer “Shakedown on 9th Street”. The moment of the evening perhaps goes to Adams’s delivery of “Prisoner” as he sings into a fairy-lit microphone on a darkened stage, the audience watching in eerie silence, or the powerful “Broken Anyway”, which he sings within touching distance of the audience on the front row.

If there is one small criticism of Adams and his band tonight, however, it’s the sheer number of indulgent Crazy Horse-like jams that appear, their inclusion making for a laboured listen.

The overriding theme tonight seems to be one of kick-ass catharsis, of finding hope amongst the ashes of a failed relationship. Adams delivers an effortless, career-spanning masterclass set in dealing with the break-up blues, proving he’s once again top of his game.