Taylor Swift, Laundry Lists & Manuscripts: Allen Miller
The most exciting artists to talk to are always the artists that have a million side projects going on at the same time. I LIVE for creatives that can’t decide what they love most, so they do it all. I find that the most well rounded, understanding, and intuitive artists are those that know multiple art forms. The writer that is also an actor approaches his lines with a different kind of responsibility and devotion, because he knows the weight of the words before he even says them. The photographer that is also a dancer, understands movement in the most intimate ways and can capture photos that are truly alive. Art has so many interconnecting layers, and when artists embrace more than one, it ends up making them a better artist as a whole. I feel like a lot of the time I run into artists that are afraid to step out of their self made boxes. Many have worked so hard to be “good” at one thing and when they are faced with the vulnerability of a new kind of creativity, it can be intimidating. I always relish in the artists that embrace that vulnerability. Those are the kinds of artists that make me a better artist. When Allen Miller; songwriter, musician, film student, writer and soon to be author reached out to tell me about his newest song, I was stoked.
Allen is from Waco, Texas. He grew up in show choir and wanted to find a path that brought him to music as career, he just wasn’t exactly sure how to get there. He didn’t feel like he fit into any of the musical spheres he was presented with so, he decided to become a film major at UT Austin. He thought getting into film, would maybe point him to the music production aspects of cinema. Instead, it opened up another creative road for him to explore: screenwriting. A few years and a bachelor’s degree later, Allen moved to LA to pursue a TV writing gig. Then, like a page out of all of our books, the pandemic happened and brought Allen right back to where he began, with music.
For the last few years, Allen has been releasing EPs on streaming platforms. They range from bubble gum pop, with songs like “20 Something”, to the incredibly intimate and impressive 2020 EP Romanticize (a must listen). His most recent song, “Better Off” is a melding of the two extremes to a comfortable middle ground. It’s an easy pop tune with an absolutely infectious melody that sticks with you hours after you’ve listened to it (I’ve been humming it for the last week).
“Better Off” is a song about letting go of a “will-they-won’t-they” kind of relationship. It’s the quintessential tug-of-war between your head and your heart. It’s about deleting phone numbers, cutting down your olive branches, and closing doors on the rooms and people that won’t have you. But most importantly, this is a song about choosing yourself.
I love the simplistic instrumentation of this song, because it really allows Allen to shine where he is the best, in his vocals and lyrics. An acoustic guitar opens the song, that leads us to a sparkling piano melody that threads itself in and out of the song, the percussion starts off in a refined manner and slowly builds to the chorus, all while Allen’s honey toned voice glides through his clever and charismatic lyrics. The vocals are incredibly impressive, because they are buttery smooth and assured while also being incredibly sincere and earnest. That attention to detail in recording the vocals is something that Allen has worked really hard on in the last few years. He records everything in his bedroom and he’s spent a lot of time doing trial and error to find what works for him. He told me that this song “sounds the most like him” and there’s something quite serendipitous about him feeling that way about a song like “Better Off”.
Like many songwriters and music makers right now, Allen is heavily inspired by Taylor Swift, and you can see this the most in his lyrics. Taylor Swift is such a great lyricist, because she can be incredibly introspective while also being visually visceral.
She’s such a great songwriter because she is able to vocally match what her lyrics are saying. If she wants to evoke a familiar, yet mysterious and sexy, coming-of-age atmosphere, she writes a song like “Cardigan” with lyrics like “vintage tee, brand new phone, high heels on cobble stone”. These lyrics tell us of status, comfort, personality, and setting and they’re the first two lines of the song! She sets these lyrics with a moody piano and an alto vocal line that elicits intrigue, secrecy, and maturity.
It’s masterful.
And it’s something that Allen has picked up on and put into his songs too. You can feel it in “Better Off” in the fourth verse.
“And I imagine you
Laughing with your roommates about all the stupid
Messages I’ve sent that you left on read
And I’ll never know if it’s all in my head”
In this section, we hear the vocal line get iritated and biting, but before it explodes, the chorus comes in with it’s charming “laundry list of getting better to do” and it soothes the ache, refocusing the lyrics back on the end goal of the song: choosing yourself.
(and just in a selfish note, I think my favorite lyrical moment of the song is in the final verse: “And it's not right, how you're just fine, while I'm here in my apartment losing my mind”. Ouch. Straight to the heart.)
Last Saturday, when I got to speak to Allen about his music, his life, and this song, I asked him where he saw his music evolving, where he saw his sound ending up and he told me something that I thought was so very fucking cool: right now, he’s not interested in purusing a performing career with music. Instead, he wants to become a professional songwriter, helping other artists write their songs.
I was kind of stunned by that. Partially, because I believe Allen could absolutely continue on the singer/songwriter path and be successful, but also because that speaks so much to who he is as an artist. He’s not looking for glory, or fame. He’s here for the process, for the tangling and untangling of lyrics and chords, for creating art to process and to heal, to connect with people. I’m not sure if it’s the fact that we’re both air signs, or that we both grew up as queer kids in the south, but either way I feel like a kindred heart with Allen. I think he views music in such a beautiful, refreshing way and talking with him was like reconnecting with a longtime friend. I want more artists like Allen. More creatives that are writing albums after work in their bedroom closets, in between editing the chapters of their novel (he’s also written a novel! I’ve heard it’s full of queer longing so you know I’m in). I want more artists that are just excited to create, without any pretenses or expectations. And I want more songs like “Better Off”. Songs that walk the fine line of heartache and liberation, that hurt and heal. Or, as Allen put it, songs that make you feel like “throwing up a middle finger and saying ‘I WILL be happy instead!’”
You can listen to Allen’s music on all Spotify and Apple Music.