Young Chicago-based singer/ sngwriter CHRIS MILLS is going from strength to strength artistically, as the release of his fourth (and best) album to date "The Silver Line" demonstrates. Whisperin' & Hollerin' tracked Chris down and via the wonders of e-mail, Chris and TIM PEACOCK had a good time chewing the fat as we can now see...
1. Although there are epic-sounding tracks on "Kiss
It Goodbye" (excellent tracks like "Tooth And Nail"
and "Signal/ Noise" spring to mind), the layers of
strings and horns are a bigger part of the tapestry with "The Silver Line." Was is a conscious move to expand the sound before you went into the studio and did the arangements take a long time?
CHRIS: "I did make a concious decision to go for something a
bit larger this time. I wanted to expand on a lot of
the things I had started to explore on "Kiss..." and I
wanted to see how the new songs would sound if there
were fleshed out to the fullest extent I could afford.
The arangements themselves were done by a few
different people but the majority of them were
excuted, handily, by David Nagler, my some time
pianist and leader of the NYC band Nova Social."
2. I'm glad you retained both Gerald (Dowd) and Ryan
(Hembrey) from the "K.I.G" sessions, along with
Brian Deck's production skills. The studio sounds
like a creative place for you all. What do these
guys bring in to the songs and also do you do your
vocals live? The emotional impact would suggest
so...
CHRIS: "Gerald and Ryan are both amazing players who i've
worked with for a long time. Due to the expense of
recording however, and since i was paying for it
myself, we kept the majority of the experimentaion
process in the rehearsal room. We really tried to have
a plan when it got down to recording. But we did
record the majority of the tracks live, as a three
piece, including the vocals."
3. I'm always attracted to the mixture or
romanticism and fatslism in your songs, Chris. Often
my favourite songs of yours (say "Suicide Note," and
"Fall" for intance) have these qualities. Have any
other writers or events specifically influenced the
way you write yourself?
CHRIS: "Everything influences the way i write. I'm a huge film
buff, and I used to read a lot of comic books and
things so I've always been very visually oriented, and
i try and bring that out a lot in my writing. And i've
always had a huge soft spot for melodrama and those
broad strokes that seem to touch large groups on a very
personal level."
4. Almost daren't ask this one: How autobiographical
is " I Could Not Stand To See You"? It's almost
unbearably heartbreaking...
CHRIS: "Everything i write is autobiographical in some way.
Otherwise they wouldn't ring true for anyone. But they
can't be too specific otherwise I don't think that
people would be able to identify with the songs in
their own lives. It's a tricky balance."
5. You also write really great, catchy rock songs
like "Sleeptalking" and "Floorboards". Can you
imagine doing a more straight ahead rock album? I
love the different tempos on your albums, but do you
think it's harder for people to get a handle on what
you're doing because of the variety of styles?
CHRIS: "I try to give the audience a little more credit than
that. I think its a shame that most albums today
aren't really albums from start to finish, but more a
few singles and a lot of filler. When i'm putting
together a record i try to think about how it works as
a whole, I try and use different sounic elements and
tempos to establish a flow so that you can put the
record on and listen to from start to finish. So that
it reads as one continuous piece of work, even though
the songs differ from each other stylistically."
6. Artistically, you're growing quickly and - to my
mind, anyway - are light years ahead of most people
now lumped uneasily under the "Alt.Country"
umbrella. Have these sort of tags become a hindrance
to you?
CHRIS: "I really don't think about those sorts of things."
7. Will you be continuing to record with THE CITY
THAT WORKS? I like the idea of the fluid line-ups
for the live shows. It seems to be morphing into a
kind of loose collective a bit like, say, WILLARD
GRANT CONSPIRACY?
CHRIS: "There are a lot of great players here in Chicago that
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i feel extremely lucky to work with. For the 5-piece
we've got a pretty solid core of folks including Ryan
and Gerald ad well as Dave Max Crawford and Fred
Lonberg-Holm. The larger combos are relatively
flexible, but i've been lucky to have pretty much the
same roster for the last few shows. So as far as the
live thing goes the line'up is becoming pretty stable.
As far as recording, whether or not i continue on with
TCTW depends on what i decide to do next. Now that
i've done such a big sounding record, I'll probably
retreat into something smaller. Only time will
tell..... "
8. I know finances often dictate when you're
touring, but I also enjoyed seeing you live in the
solo acoustic form. Do you enjoy the different
dynamic of the solo acoustic troubadour thing and is
it more creative a writing situation when you're
away from home?
CHRIS: "I do enjoy playing solo.I really like the personaly
rapport you can develop with an audience over the
course of an evening, that you can't really acheive
when there are 9 other guys on stage. "
"Writing i do anywhere. i never know when songs are
going to hit me. Sometimes its oon the road, sometimes
its in the bath. you never know....."
9. Perhaps inevitably, Chicago itself sometimes
features in your songs. Can you imagine you'd still
write about elements of the city if you moved away?
Steve Wynn told me he writes more about LA now he
lives in New York...
CHRIS: "I think that Chicago is just such a great musical
environment, because of the people who pay here, and
the opportunity the city presents, that its hard for
me to see myself working anywhere else. but there are
other times when i feel like i may be too comfortable
here, and that i may need a change. I just don't see
it happening any time soon."
10. I really like your version of Hawksley Workman's
"Don't Be Crushed." I'm not sure which version I
prefer, actually. How did you come up with the
arrangement (it's almost trip-hop!) and what
attracted you to the song in the first place?
CHRIS: "I just think its a really great song! Hawksley opened
a tour for me a couple of years ago and after hearing
him solo for a few weeks I totally fell in love with
his writing. We both come from that sort of
tragic-romantic tradition. "
"The arrangement just sort of came out of how we were
doing it in rehearsal, and then we spiced it up a
little in the studio. but i wanted to leave it pretty
spare, because it is so well written it doesn't really
need anything else."
11. Final question, Chris. A quick plug for your
concert/ website 'Covers' CD: "Tell It Like It
Isn't." For those readers who don't know, it;s an
8-track collection of you performing songs by the
likes of people like Leon Payne, Freakwater,
Fountains Of Wayne and Alex Chilton. What do you
really love about these specific songs and will you
do a second volume at some stage?
CHRIS: "I don't know if i will get around to doing another
volume, but i wanted to release this one because i had
these songs lying around that i had recorded
basically for my own amusement, but found myself
listening to them a lot because i loved the songs so
much and now had them all in one place. i think the
common thread between all of them, and the thing that
really attracted me to them is that they are all just
really well written songs. And most of them were
written by friends of mine who i think more people
should know about!"
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