At 65 years of age, Bryan Adams has spent the majority of his life making music. Growing up in Canada, Adams was already part of a Rock-n-Roll band from a young age, and at sixteen recorded an album as the vocalist for Sweeney Todd. A stepping stone for Adams, he has spent over fifty years making music altogether. Extremely impressive, Adam’s self-titled debut album, released in 1980 and 1981, and the 1981 album You Want It, You Got It, were growth periods.
However, Adams would have a massive international breakthrough in 1983 with Cuts Like a Knife. An album that found Adams topping charts in the USA and beyond, it would be a launching point into becoming a Rock-n-Roll legend. Overall, one of the most successful artists in the last forty years, Adams has multi-millions in albums, has had a list of chart-topping singles, and now, in 2025, returns with his brand new studio album, Roll With The Punches.
Released on August 29, 2025, Roll With The Punches comes three years after 2022’s So Happy It Hurts, and marks the first release through Adams’s own label, Bad Records. His sixteenth overall studio record, it is worth mentioning that in 2022, he also released two more albums, Classic and Classic Pt. II (which were re-recorded tracks), before 2023 and 2024, when he released some spectacular live recordings, titled Live at the Royal Albert Hall, which captured performances of select older albums in their entirety. With that in mind, there has been plenty of activity for Bryan Adams in recent years, and a great way to cap it all off is with the brand new songs featured on Roll With The Punches.
A hard-driven Rock-n-Roll collection, Roll With The Punch is a total of ten tracks that will really jump start listeners. Starting with an energetic opening that leads into the title track, the song continues with a catchy nature, with inspirational lyrics about defying the odds. From here, “Make Up Your Mind” throws out old burdens and makes room for new adventures in life. Truly motivational and thriving, this mood is continued with “Never Ever Let You Go” before “A Little More Understanding,” which features a great steel guitar sound and an ’80s piano touch that might make you feel a bit nostalgic while listening.
Moving right along, “Life is Beautiful” continues to spread positivity and the concept of celebrating life as it is. Then there is “Love is Stronger Than Hate,” with a harmonica opening, which is quite thoughtful, authentic, and relatable. Tapping into “Love is Stronger Than Hate” more profoundly, it is absolutely pure and touching, as the title alone might give away already. Then the rhythmic “How’s That Workin’ For Ya” gets your toe tapping, and with a slightly sleazier sensation, it will catch your attention, sticking out from the rest. However, “Two Arms to Hold You” is quite the opposite and is filled with heart-sobbing lyrics that will get you swaying along and release a deep sigh while thinking of a loved one. This is while “Be the Reason” is chock full of good advice, and “Will We Ever Be Friends Again” brings a melancholic closing to it all.
Overall, Bryan Adams’s Roll With The Punches is filled with some absolutely brilliant songs. Timeless and passionate music, it is the good-feeling Rock-n-Roll that everyone needs in today’s world of cruelty and uncertainty. That is why Cryptic Rock gives Roll With The Punches 5 out of 5 stars.
){kind=link}
No comment