Rhett Miller talks about his ‘Nick Drake album’ ahead of show at LA’s Largo

In 2024, Rhett Miller was on the road with his band, Old 97’s, when his voice started to fray, showing wear and tear at both the higher and lower ends of his range.

A specialist found a cyst on one vocal cord and a polyp on the other, and Miller opted for surgery that December.

The odds were that he’d make a full recovery, but he knew that some people, including Julie Andrews, never got their voice completely back after surgery. So before the procedure, he carved out time to record his tenth solo album (along with 13 Old 97’s albums), “A Lifetime of Riding By Night.” 

The album, produced by Old 97’s bandmate, Murray Hammond, is a quiet and reflective album, with lines like “Well, how did I get to the shape that I’m in / A younger man’s thoughts, some tonic, some gin” and “I am much too young and able for my final song to sing.”

The surgery was a success, and after an imposed period of silence to recover, Miller is back on the road. He’ll be performing a solo acoustic show at Largo at the Coronet on Friday. 

Miller, who also teaches songwriting at The New School in Manhattan, talked about the surgery, playing live and songwriting in a recent video interview, which has been edited for length and clarity.  

Q. I like the vulnerability we hear in your voice on “Riding By Night” because it fits the songs, but were you tempted to go back after the surgery and re-record the vocals?

Afterward, I realized my voice actually works better than it has in five years, and maybe we should go do the whole thing again. But I agreed with what you’re saying, and Murray said it captures a moment in time. It’s so human and flawed, which fit the theme of a lot of the songs, and it gave the record a special sound.

Q. You’ve told me in the past that you give Old 97’s “first dibs” on songs you write, but the songs on “Riding by Night” feel specifically like solo songs.

Murray was the one who chose from the 40 songs I had stacked up. He pulled out 20 for us to consider and then made a folder of songs for the Old 97’s for our next record, which we’re going to make next month. 

But it is true that the songs Murray chose for me were these weird songs that I might not even have used for a solo record because they felt so vulnerable and had so much restraint. They’re quiet, thoughtful, sometimes kind of sad songs, and I’m too hung up on the idea of being an entertainer to make a thoughtful, restrained, sad, vulnerable record. But Murray made me do it; he kept telling me, “This is your Nick Drake record.”

Q. Will these vulnerable, quiet songs be tough to add to your live setlist?

I always joke to the crowd that I’m not going to play too many new songs because I’m not a monster. I know that when people go to hear the artists that they love and give you their time and money, it’s not about me, it’s about them. I want to give them a show with the songs they want to hear, so they don’t leave angry about not hearing their favorite song. So in my solo shows, I actually mostly do Old 97 songs and then a selection of songs from my solo records.

I’ll only do a few songs off the new record, “All Over Again,” “Come As You Are,” and “All For You,” which I find is one that goes over pretty well. Some people have asked me about “People Are Lifted,” which is such a dark, weird song, or “The Bells of St. Mike’s,” which is such a sad song. I’m glad they’re there on the record, but I’m probably not going to be pulling those out for a live show. 

Q. Even the sad songs have uplifting parts, and your more upbeat songs have poignant lines or minor chords and notes. It’s often true on Old 97’s songs, too. Is that a conscious thing?

It’s something that the Old 97′s have joked about forever. We figured it out consciously around the “Fight Songs” album that if you have a sad song, make it sound kind of happy or fun, and if you have a happy song, let it sound a little bit sad.

If you have something that’s sad and lean into that, it can become too much, but if you’re able to temper it, it winds up feeling more complicated, which is the way of the human experience. I do love the dichotomy. I love the violent ambivalence. 

Q. When you’re writing lyrics, do you stop and say, “That’s a good line,” or is it only afterwards that you realize it?

As songwriters, we are our own first audience. It’s incumbent on us and necessary to realize when something is great, because it’s the fuel that keeps us going.

Sometimes those lines get cut as you go through your revision process, because the song can’t bear the weight of the cleverness, or you’ve moved in a different direction, but they are often the lines that are a little transcendent, that take the song from being pretty good to being something really special. 

Q. Are there lines in songs you look back on and think you should have rewritten?

Man, it’s a lifelong battle. The idea of finishing a song and being done with it is such a great feeling. But sometimes another pass would have done wonders. But also, the idea that a song is never finished is a real problem for a lot of songwriters. So it’s a fine line that you’re always having to walk. 

There are so many early songs that I wish I could just have one more pass at because one verse is great, but then another is just sitting there.

Q. Are there lines you almost ditched that you grew to love?

“No Simple Machine” is a weird song, and there’s a lyric I thought was too clever and cloying: “He said, ‘Can I buy you a drink?’ / What he meant was, ‘Can I buy you?’ / Yeah, his eyes were pits of despair / But his accent recalled the bayou.”

I thought, “What am I doing? It’s too much,” like putting too many coats of paint on, but in retrospect I really love that lyric. 

And I do think intuition and inspiration are more valuable than being fully aware. Calculation is the killer of art. If you’re trying to make something that’s brilliant, it’s invariably going to stink of desperation. 

On this album, I didn’t realize at first how many moments there were of mortality or injury. I’ve never used the word stitch in any song. And on this record, it appears twice. So I’m getting ready for surgery and unconsciously singing songs about stitches.