Send "Buddy Miller " Ringtones to your Cell 
| Rollingstones |
 Take me back," plead husband and wife Buddy and Julie Miller on "Ellis County," the lead track of their superb new album. The Millers' nostalgia is audible in their blues progressions and Appalachian—flavored twang. But these alternative—country heroes steer clear of the complacency that afflicts their genre, electrocharging their music with the heat and heart of conjugal passion, and, at spots, with a rock & roll stomp that puts many a vaunted garage band to shame. Robert Plant and other guests chip in, but the real star is Buddy, who brings a poet's knack for fresh imagery to songs of spiritual thirst and romantic strife. "If all our heartaches were in a stack," he sings,"they'd go all the way up to heaven and back."...full text |
| Pastemagazine |
| Just how much heartache can two people mend with a song? Teenage boys don’t typically learn how to play the guitar in order to make some grand artistic statement. Most are just looking to stir up two things—a glorious racket and, if the fates are feeling particularly generous, a bit of attention from the fairer gender. When Buddy Miller sat on the edge of his bed as a kid—long before the unruly mane fanning out from beneath his trademark ball cap turned grey—and tentatively strummed along with his favorite rock LPs, I doubt he had any idea just how well he’d manage, in both respects. Beginning with 1995’s Your Love And Other Lies, Miller unleashed a string of gritty, soulful records that earned him a reputation as one of the finest—many would argue the finest—living practitioners of country music. And then, of course, there’s his coterie of beautiful, silver-throated songbirds: Emmylou Harris, Gillian Welch, Alison Krauss, Shawn Colvin, Patty Griffin. And, of course, his wife Julie, whom he fell for in the mid ’70s while the two were in Austin band Rick Stein & the Alleycats. The couple married in 1981, cementing a remarkable musical partnership. Even though Buddy and Julie’s first official duo record didn’t arrive until 2001, the pair had collaborated extensively for years, writing together and performing on each other’s records. That first joint release, titled simply Buddy & Julie Miller, was named Album of the Year at the Americana Music Association’s first annual awards show and widely lauded by the music press....full text |
| Popmatters |
| Buddy Miller may well be, as some prominent voices hold, the past decade’s best artist of his kind. But for all his admirable modesty, you’d never know it. For that reason, a new Buddy Miller record is an important and understated event, like an appearance by the world’s most valuable sixth man. A new record with his talented wife Julie is even more remarkable because in spite of all the collaborating they’ve done throughout the years, this is only their second proper album together. Miller is following up a minor classic, Universal United House of Prayer, and although Julie Miller has been quieter recently—her last solo album was 1999’s Broken Things—the stage is set for a brilliant return. And with Written in Chalk, the pair makes almost every move you’d want them to. Predictably, the twin highlights throughout Written in Chalk are Julie’s songwriting and Buddy’s guitar. Julie’s songs are sharp-eyed swirls of earnest observation, so delicate sometimes that they feel fragile, but always undergirded by sturdy melodies. Buddy’s guitar playing is both uncannily sympathetic and unfailingly economical, a quality honed, no doubt, by all those years as a sideman. Both are endearing, slightly rough-hewn vocalists, and the instrumental support they get is solid throughout. (Two ringers worth noting: Jay Bellerose, one of American music’s most remarkable drummers, makes a too-brief appearance; and Larry Campell, a veteran of Bob Dylan’s Never-ending Tour, Levon Helm’s Midnight Rambles, and Phil Lesh’s Friends, contributes mandolin and fiddle.)...full text |
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