Paul Ryan is a guitarist and singer for the Kansas

Kansas

Kansas is a US state located in the Midwestern United States. It is named after the Kansas River which flows through it, which in turn was named after the Kansa Native American tribe, which inhabited the area. The tribe's name is often said to mean "people of the wind" or "people of the south...

-based technical death metal

Technical death metal

Technical death metal is a musical subgenre of death metal that focuses on complex rhythms, riffs and song structures. Technical experimentation in death metal began in the late '80s and early '90s by bands such as Death, Atheist and Cynic...

 band Origin. He is the only member who has been continuously in the band since its formation in 1997. He is an extremely proficient guitarist in the genre of death metal

Death metal

Death metal is an extreme subgenre of heavy metal. It typically employs heavily distorted guitars, tremolo picking, deep growling vocals, blast beat drumming, minor keys or atonality, and complex song structures with multiple tempo changes....

 and extensively utilizes extremely difficult variations of sweep picking in his playing. On Decibel magazine's August 2007 list of the all time top 20 death metal guitarists, he was #20.
Prior to the band Origin, Ryan played in bands in relative obscurity outside of his hometown of Topeka, Kansas.
Necrotomy in 1991 &
Abomination 1992-1993