Ryan Adams talks about the time he kicked a heckler out of a gig for shouting for 'Summer of '69'

Ryan Adams. Bryan Adams. Yup, there's no two ways about it - they're similar names. They're not, however, very similar musicians - which led to a lot of angst in the early part of the former's career.

He's well-established as a musician these days, but back in 2002 Ryan Adams was still in the early-ish days of his career, having released the career-making 'Gold' the previous year.

He was also a lot more sensitive to heckling back then, as he famously kicked a heckler/wannabe comedian who insisted on continuously shouting for the Bryan Adams hit 'Summer of '69' at Nashville's Ryman Auditorium.

Now, he's explained what really happened in an entertaining op-ed for The New York Times.

“I finally had enough and piped up: “Who is it? Who is shouting? Tell me who it is!”," he wrote. "I asked the person to raise his hand so I could see him. He did not. Finally people pointed furiously to a seat not far from me in the front. I walked down the few wooden steps in front of the stage to the aisle where all the fingers pointed.

By the time I got there, I was so angry. I felt humiliated, but what else could be done? Either way I had lost something. Unlike a more seasoned comic or musician, I didn’t have the experience to ignore a situation like this, or to use wit to turn it around. I felt a kind of disappointment and disillusionment that I had never known — and it was in front of a thousand-plus people.”

After walking down the stage to confront the heckler, he said "Hey man, if you were trying to ruin the show you succeeded, but I need to try and finish this — it’s my job.’ I pulled out two $20 bills and said: ‘Here is your money, please take a taxi and leave here. Go home and take an aspirin. Please. Leave.’

"I walked back to the stage," he continued. "People applauded. The fourth wall was destroyed in the worst possible way. But this moment, where I decided to do what the security and the people around him would not, felt genuine. It is what I would have done if I were in the audience.”

To his credit, Adams has mellowed over the years and learned to take the heckling less personally - even covering 'Summer of '69' at the same venue in 2015.