Miracle Mile: Coffee and Stars (Miracle Mile)

 |   |  1 min read

Miracle Mile: Yuri's Dream
Miracle Mile: Coffee and Stars (Miracle Mile)

As with the equally wonderful Blue Nile, this UK band (of Marcus Cliffe and Trevor Jones plus guests) take a leisurely approach to albums and only release something when it is refined and ready.
Miracle Mile too work the treacherous -- and often casually dismissed -- area of "adult pop", that is music based around memorable and sometimes delicate melodies, and lyrics that don't talk down to you.
MM's lyrics are often about various conceptions of "home", finding a place in this world through love and redemption, or allusive and slightly mysterious.
There is a subtle alt.country aspect to what they do (lovely steel guitars) and delivered by Jones' remarkably smooth voice, Miracle Mile's albums have consistently won critical praise if not sales -- so you'd like to think this compilation of 18 songs drawn from all their albums might bring them to greater attention.
Certainly there is a sweetness over the long haul that some might find a touch too rich, but taken together you cannot help but be impressed by people who can write a song inspired by Russian astronaut Yuri Gagarin, reference John Wayne and the Guggenheim Museum, have a song (rightly) picked as one of the best of 2007 by the Sunday Times in Britain -- and still remain below the radar?
I've brought them to attention previously but this compilation available through amazon or their website gives me another opportunity.

Share It

Your Comments

post a comment

More from this section   Music at Elsewhere articles index

Aaradhna: Treble and Reverb (Frequency)

Aaradhna: Treble and Reverb (Frequency)

Although critics and commentators will inevitably, and rightly, point out the influence of Amy Winehouse in a couple of place on this, Aaradhna's third album, that doesn't change the fact that this... > Read more

Irving: Death in the Garden, Blood on the Flowers (Rhythmethod)

Irving: Death in the Garden, Blood on the Flowers (Rhythmethod)

Because my record collection has such wayward but much loved albums by bands as diverse as the Unforgiven (spaghetti western rock), the Shoes (power pop), Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark (early... > Read more

Elsewhere at Elsewhere

THE WIDE BRIDGE NEVER THE TIGHTROPE (2023): The plague of risk-averse pop

THE WIDE BRIDGE NEVER THE TIGHTROPE (2023): The plague of risk-averse pop

A week or so ago over lunch, a couple of us were talking about the state of local music. “There's just a lack of risk,” he said with obvious exasperation. And that's something... > Read more

Womad Artist 2014: James Lindsay of Braebach

Womad Artist 2014: James Lindsay of Braebach

Double bassist James Lindsay of Scotland's Breabach says what they will be delivering at the forthcoming Womad in Taranaki is quite simple: “Expect a varied and exciting showcase of... > Read more