Way back in my youth there was a TV show called The A-Team. In it, the commander of the band of misfits exclaims, “I love it when a plan comes together,” after some hare-brained, seat-of-the-pants scheme turns out for the good. I think John R. Miller must have uttered something similar when he finished recording his 4th album, The Great Unknowing. Instead of sticking with the people and places he knew in Nashville he ventured west to Tulsa and the recently reopened Church Studio, home to the great Leon Russell. He sourced a local set of musicians, including John Fullbright on keys and Muskrat Jones on pedal steel and dobro. Despite not having familiarity with Miller’s music, the a-listers knocked out the record in 3 days, with time left over to record a few covers.
A number of the songs have a thread about the journey through life, the great unknowing of the title. The phrase itself comes up in Tollbooth, a country ballad about being alone with your thoughts while looking out the windshield at the changes in the world around you. Steering Wheel Drums is more rock than country, but again samples a common experience everyone’s seen or had. Another reference to the unknowing is Far From the Station. It’s a little greasier in sound, with Fullbright’s keyboards adding a laid back vibe. When Miller notes, “this thing didn’t come with instructions” it’s a comment on every relationship everywhere. Walk of Life slows down the tempo and does a southern drawl version of the Dire Straits original.
Miller’s wry observations and turns of phrase shine through on a number of cuts. Day Drinking is a finger-snapping, singer-songwriter tune with the band adding a light-hearted soundtrack full of dobro and fiddle. The we’ve-all-been-there moment comes when he notes, “I wasn’t gonna go on a tear, but you can’t plan for everything.” Looking For a Place to Die is a commentary on how most of us struggle just to get through life while the upper class is “a whole lotta two’s and three’s looking out for number one.” If You Could Only See Me Now is a William Matheny-penned dance hall country shuffle. Despite the verse that “every day’s a four-leaf clover”, I hear a bit of irony in how it comes out.
The term alt-country originated when some artists fused a punk music aesthetic on top of old-school country stylings. For most people that description triggers an image in their mind of a band tearing it up with guitars and drums, fiddles and banjos. John R. Miller has a lot of that same background, but from the perspective of a West Virginia-raised kid who played in string bands before he plugged in and turned it up. That resulted in a bespoke alt-country that’s identifiable from the get-go. For The Great Unknowing he took his philosophy out to Tulsa and let some of the Red Dirt a-team take a crack at it. Turns out that plan came together for a different sound and yet remains John R. Miller in all his glory.
About the author: I've actually driven from Tehatchapee to Tonopah. And I've seen Dallas from a DC-9 at night.