The music industry may have taken a proverbial arrow to the knee this year, causing everyone involved to rethink their career paths. Some musicians are eager to pivot and capitalize on our new reality, others are prepared to pack it in, and Michael S. Ryan is preparing to weather the storm. The latest in his series of monthly singles, “This Way” is an ode to “believing in the path you’re on, inspiration, and the thing inside us all that motivates us to do what we do.”
That might sound like a lot of optimism, especially with the planet throwing wildfires, plagues, aliens, locusts, and now, murder hornets at us. But this isn’t the first time Ryan has had to endure a career setback. When “This Way” was written ten years ago, he was facing a string of challenges that would have given any musician cause for second thoughts. 2020 just happened to provide the rainy day Ryan was saving the song for.
“My old band had just broken up and I’d already quit university,” says Ryan. “I didn’t sing at this point and had a shoulder injury that stopped me from playing guitar for two years. But I still knew I wanted to pursue music.”
A guitar player unable to play a guitar but still determined to stay on his path, Ryan began exploring new territory. While enduring the arduous process of recovering from his injury he took the time to teach himself how to sing and play piano.
“I just sang along with albums I liked, and did scales. For hours and hours every day. That plus the physio and exercises I needed to get strong enough to play guitar again.”
Ryan explains that “This Way” came out of that period of struggle, discovery, and creation. It encapsulates the belief that murder hornets are just another character-building speedbump on the road of life.
“It’s a song that puts faith into the bigger things – whatever they may be – to help us find what we’re supposed to.”
“There were a million different reasons telling me I should probably call it quits in the music world, but I just wanted it so bad I kept going. I don’t even really know why. I guess at the root of it, that’s what the song is about”.