Rob I. Miller (Mall Walk, Blues Lawyer) to release solo debut as Christian Singles

>> Every generation has had their moment that felt like the world was coming to an end, but it’d be hard to argue that 2020 hasn’t distilled that feeling into history’s most potent dose of despair. Though the new Christian Singles album was written during the early days of quarantine, it wasn’t the pandemic, the looming election, or impending climate change that caused Rob I. Miller to take stock. News that his father’s cancer had returned dredged up unresolved pain and brought a new sense of urgency to issues that had long lain dormant. Maybe Another Time, the 9-song debut under Miller’s solo moniker, confronts the difficult questions about family and forgiveness, and aging in a desperate world.

Release date: 10/2/20

The record opens with a plodding drum machine and deceptively lighthearted acoustic guitars before ominous keyboard loops collide with a wall of distortion. “Digging up the past just to bury again” serves as the track's mission statement - maybe looking for answers is a selfish pursuit when the time you have left is uncertain, and the only resolution left is to bury the hurt anew.

“Junk Drawer” fades in from under the blanket of feedback, propelled by rubbery bass lines and carefully considered washes of springy reverb. There’s comfort to be found in Miller’s delicate, conversational delivery as he turns the questions outward, asking “Did you tire of yourself? Today you seem like someone else”. The intimacy of these songs feels like the warm embrace of a cassette you’ve left in the player for months, worn out under the sun until the tracks have bled together and acquired that intangible quality bestowed only by graceful decay.

The album's center tackles questions of bringing new life into a world on the brink, and the fear of burdening them with the same issues that have plagued your own life. The chorus stained guitars on “Collapse” nostalgically invoke Springsteen and The Cure, while Miller wonders if his “cancer of thought” will be “taken by the young heir”. “A Dream Ends Without Starting” questions newfound stability after a string of false starts, wondering if history is doomed to repeat itself, or if the cycle can be broken.

There’s a magnetism to this collection that makes the case for including Miller in the canon of modern singer-songwriters taking the classic-rock songbook and carrying it forward - a compelling work by an artist grappling with loss and regret. Maybe Another Time feels uncannily prescient in a time where the future is a looming question mark, and timeless in the questions it asks about family, and putting aside pain to salvage what’s left.

- Nik Soelter