Soulful Ryan Adams Plays "Neutron Dance" to Make Techies Cry

When Ryan Adams stepped onstage at the Code Conference, his mission was simple: To stir up emotion through some of his famous soulful strumming. But he knew his audience would be a tough one, so he started with a joke they could get behind.

“I got some time to kill; I tried to pay my hotel bill with bitcoin,” he said, his face hidden behind dark glasses and unruly hair onstage at the Terranea Resort in Rancho Palos Verdes, Calif.

He was introduced by musician and producer Don Was, who argued that music is part of our prelinguistic human nature, which technology tricks with ProTools can muddle.

And as soon as Adams started to play a super-slow version of “Neutron Dance,” the crowd, who’d earlier seen robot demos and discussions of net neutrality, settled right in. If he’d played two songs, there would have been some lighters in the air.

Just no time to
Stop and get away
’Cause I work so hard
To make it every day

Here’s the video of his performance:

And the original Pointer Sisters version here:

This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

Will you support Vox’s explanatory journalism?

Most news outlets make their money through advertising or subscriptions. But when it comes to what we’re trying to do at Vox, there are a couple reasons that we can't rely only on ads and subscriptions to keep the lights on.

First, advertising dollars go up and down with the economy. We often only know a few months out what our advertising revenue will be, which makes it hard to plan ahead.

Second, we’re not in the subscriptions business. Vox is here to help everyone understand the complex issues shaping the world — not just the people who can afford to pay for a subscription. We believe that’s an important part of building a more equal society. We can’t do that if we have a paywall.

That’s why we also turn to you, our readers, to help us keep Vox free. If you also believe that everyone deserves access to trusted high-quality information, will you make a gift to Vox today?

One-Time Monthly Annual

$5/month

$10/month

$25/month

$50/month

Other

$

Yes, I'll give $5/month

Yes, I'll give $5/month

We accept credit card, Apple Pay, and Google Pay. You can also contribute via