T Y S O N R I T T E R A R T

Trying to compose some coherent thought about what this record is has been difficult for me. It’s a jumble of emotions and streams of consciousness purged from deep in my belly. It drifts in and out of personal confrontations with myself and those in my life, it paddles into some dark waters maybe, some citrine ones too, I don’t know. I just know how I feel about it now that it’s done and out in the world. There were a lot of firsts for me on this including writing a song with my friend Chris ,and it’s probably one of the more pure offerings on this collection. Ill never forget how it felt to write it as it was being recorded, the engineer @killahcortez racing around the room as the adrenals were spitting Chris and I off the walls, just catching the tail of the wave from the cosmos. Writing music can feel like so many things, but when it’s pure and magical, you can step aside from yourself and serve the song as it’s coming in. So many things I can remember now jotting this down, but the biggest takeaway for me has been the gratitude I feel for everyone who helped this record find its life. Wheels and Scotty, you guys brought this home at the end, I was emotionally and spiritually bankrupt those last couple months, and you guys held it together, forging through the way we had to reverse engineer the bomb, and without that incredible dedication, well, you know we’d be up shits creek. To everyone who said they liked the demos when I sent them and was too nervous to send to Wheels- Meg, Jeff, my wife and brother, mikey, Chris, and Max. Without your support that they were worth chasing, well, I’m not sure we’d have much in the sandbox. Thanks to E from Eels for not digging Get This for his record. Every left turn always ends up some other kinda Right. Even if you’re just walking in circles, it’s who’s on the walk with you that matters most. To my beloved Elena and our soul-centering boys- you are the entirety of my being. You show me every day how creativity is the language of love. Cheers

The little people on the plane

They pulled on fences for wandering glimpses, like Outsiders looking on to a playground with Midas eyes and everything they could see-saw would stay gold Pony Boy. We were all living on Tulsa time like it was eternity, laughing at the moon and the salty stars he was sweating over some romance that we’d remember as community. Like we never had it before, but that we had it at all made us want it all forever. 📸-@madwaltphotography

I took these photos last night in the company of a group of college seniors who were about 12 hours into their lives as graduates. It was just after midnight, and their perception of the world as they have known it to be for the last four years had ended in a return to Saturn. They were kind enough to let me share space with them in a profound moment of primitive abandonment -an exaltation of joy and sorrow. I was fascinated to witness this rite of passage I myself never had a chance to experience. The whole moment was rather heavy and beautiful, and I thought this effigy scorched in flames really marked the moment well.

My art is up for sale at @springbreakartshow . Go check it out, and take one off the wall.

See my work at the @springbreakartshow Running May 6-12 75 Varick st 10th floor I’ll be there in person on the 7th Very special thanks to @nickthune for sharing this space with me, and an especially overwhelming thank you to the curators @pcbmaloney and @kuaseykarinen for making this show such a feral dream come true for me. “Paradise 1985” Oh say, can you see how good they had it? Just like paradise for the naive privleged few cruising the minimum wage luxury amber waves on 50 cent pops and 300 dollar cars drinking and driving on 20 cent a gallon gas sucking up the sun that shined only for us. High school sweethearts never get the belly ache when you’re young dumb fat and happy. Star gazing shooting blanks, well who wants to hit those anyway?We had it all and we didn’t know all we had until we turned around and it was too late to keep flipping burgers. Daddy grabbed his Bible Belt and took us out back and said drop your drawers cowboy.” For my mom and dad. 📹- @aknightp

Travel in scribbles, doodles, and oodles but unfortunately no more noodles… but square pants

🚬👶🏼 🔗 dreamt up in a vintage shop in Vegas, chainstitched at my studio in Kansas City and worn at a @therejects single release house show in LA, a custom piece to get @tysonritter in touch with his inner baby boy 👶🏼 thanks for the 🎥 @aknightp #chainstitchembroidery #chainstitch #allamericanrejects #rejects #aar #singer114w103 #dickies #jumpsuit #vintage #vintagedickies

I’m proud to announce that I’ll be showing my work alongside a fellow artist and brilliant comedian, the ever enchanting @nickthune for NYC’s @springbreakartshow this year. Location- 75 Varick Street, NY NY May 6-7 (VIP) May 8-12 general public It’s been a long road to this point in my craft, and I’m eternally grateful first and foremost for the inspiration and belief of @erin_casadei , without her I’d have stopped as soon as I started. And a BIG thank you to the greatest human, artist, and curator whose art I actually found first, (leading into a correspondence of mutual admiration and lovely fireside musings of purpose-for the past three years?!) the great @pcbmaloney . Thank you for pushing me into this opportunity and believing in my work. I couldn’t be more tickled to debut in the big apple, and I owe that all to you and @kuaseykarinen for putting Nick and I together for this. Gratitude abounds! See you in that sleepless city!

20 original portraits 20 dear friends and loved ones in my life For sale (link in bio), ALL proceeds benefit @actionagainsthunger Every penny. No bullshit. Let’s feed some people, people.

"I’m absolutely humbled and eternally grateful to see something that this band started when we were 17 turn into something that has now become multi-generational for a whole different audience." @tysonritter of @therejects x @1883magazine /tyson-ritter/ Interview @hello.imrachel Photography @annaleemedia Styling @edwin.j.ortega Grooming @virginie.pineda Photo assistant / BTS @alexannspencer Production @hello.imrachel Special thanks @flashausinc #tysonritter #theallamericanrejects

‘BUS 24’ I spent probably a quarter of my young adult life on a school bus. We lived in what was called the rural route for the public school bus stop program. My morning commute was over an hour and a half and the washboard dirt roads always felt like we were riding on a giant bumbling sleigh. It was a community of us kids that sat in the back, the “long haulers” that had to endure the longest ride. Long haulers were the ones who lived in the trailer parks, in the houses that smelled like cats, sporting the dried milk mustache mismatched clothes still not having slept when their parents fought about the finances all night. The bench seats of old 24 were our beds, our jackets and book bags our bedding, and we’d get the rest of our nights sleep there to be woken up at our school from the air-brake alarm clock. My first crushes, my first busted lip, my first of many things were found in the back of bus 24. Grateful for my brothers and sisters who were on the long haul with me.