Mike Ryan Releases Stunning New Album ‘The Space Where You Should Be’
In The Space Where You Should Be, Mike Ryan crafts a world that feels both intimately familiar and delicately untouchable — a soft echo of memories half-remembered but fully felt. Across ten tracks, Ryan invites listeners into a new world shaped by vulnerability, spacious arrangements, and an effortless sense of quiet resilience.
Mike Ryan is a Wirral-based singer-songwriter who has gained recognition for his music in Liverpool. He is known for blending Indie-folk and alt-pop styles and has been featured in events at the Liverpool Philharmonic Music Room and Start Yard, where he launched this latest album. He is also a two-time winner of the Liverpool Acoustic Songwriting Challenge – two of his winning entries also feature on this album. Known for writing music that speaks to all who listen, Mike Ryan has cemented himself as a key feature of the local music scene.
Opening with Can Never Be, Ryan sets the tone with a song that drifts between acceptance and longing. His vocals carry a gentle ache that never begs for pity, but instead extends a hand to anyone who’s ever sat in the hollow of what might have been. Heartbeats pulses with a sense of excitement — simple yet insistent, its production by Jon Lawton balances subtle guitar lines with just enough space for Ryan’s voice to breathe. There’s a heartbeat in the production itself — steady, human, imperfect. The song drives the album on with a sense of certainty.
The centrepiece, Lily’s Last Waltz, is perhaps the album’s most cinematic moment. Featuring Nicola Hardman on piano and vocals, with Liz Owen’s ethereal backing harmonies, the song feels like a delicate dance through grief and memory. A tribute to the late, great Liverpool icon Paul O’Grady, the track is a poignant reminder of the impact of a legend on the city and the world.
Tracks like Breathe Again and This Feeling lift the album from quiet introspection to moments of cautious hope. They hint at the possibility of renewal, small glimpses of light flickering through the album’s dusky atmosphere. Leaving and The Distance close in on the album’s emotional core — the push and pull of absence and presence, how leaving can be an act of love as much as staying. There’s a gentle finality here that feels earned rather than forced.
By the time we reach the closing track, Palace Of The Peacock, Ryan has taken us through a journey where the empty spaces speak as loudly as the words. It’s a record that lingers — in the room, in your head and most importantly, in your heart.
The Space Where You Should Be sits beside you, honest and unhurried. It’s an album for anyone who’s ever found comfort in the echoes of silence, the weight of a memory, or the promise of an unfinished conversation. With this album, Mike Ryan continues to show why he is a key voice within the local music scene. His musician is unapologetically his own and he speaks from his soul, taking us all along for the ride.
The Space Where You Should Be is out now.
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