Rhett Miller of the alt-country band Old 97's comes to Plymouth on Friday for solo show

Musician/author/guitarist Rhett Miller said there are many more creative outlets he wants to explore. That's pretty amazing when you consider what he has accomplished so far.

Miller is the singer/guitarist and songwriter for the Dallas rock band Old 97's, who have released a dozen studio albums, a handful of EPs and a live album since their 1993 beginnings. As a solo artist, Miller released his latest album, "The Misfit," in September, his eighth solo effort.

Since 2019, Miller has been hosting "Wheels Off," a podcast with the charming subtitle of "A Show About the Messy Reality Behind Creative Life," in which he interviews artists from a variety of disciplines about how they create their art. And last August, Little Brown released "The Baby Changing Station," a rhyming picture book for kids Miller wrote, which The New York Times said was a "super-fun, original and solidly constructed story."

More recently, fans may have seen Miller and the rest of Old 97's on "The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon" on Dec. 2, when they served as Kevin Bacon's backup band – or when Bacon temporarily joined Old 97's to perform "Here It Is Christmastime," a tune they'd done together on the "Guardians of the Galaxy Holiday Special." On Jan. 6, Miller served as a co-host for the Bowie Birthday Bash, where a variety of musicians performed David Bowie songs as tribute to the late singer.

Rhett Miller's solo tour headlines The Spire Center in Plymouth on Friday night with Texas singer/songwriter Salim Nourallah opening.

"I will admit, my co-host Wesley Stace, known better as John Wesley Harding, is a more obvious choice for that Bowie program," Miller laughed from his Hudson Valley home this week. "Wesley is British, which is what you'd expect more than a seventh-generation Texan singing Bowie songs. But that's just a testament to Bowie and the wide range of his appeal, across so many types and generations of fans. I know Bowie was a major influence on me."

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Did Miller ever try to write a Bowie-type song?

"I find it doesn't work if you try to write a certain way," Miller answered. "The main thing for me is to not let the critical voices in my head shut me down. If I can't keep those negative voices in my head at bay, it doesn't allow me to see so much more of my true self, and be as vulnerable. So my focus is on ignoring those voices and powering through, and this is a kind of method Bowie espoused."

Miller was just off a podcast with Julia Cameron, author of "The Artist's Way" and a teacher and writer who specializes in "creative unblocking." It was one of his favorite podcasts, but the whole series, 130 episodes, has been a revelation for him.

"The podcast has produced some pretty incredible interviews," Miller said. "The subjects come from so many different disciplines. ... I am not surprised by the things they have in common, but more so by the way different people approach creating. It's been very useful for me personally and I've made some great connections. The cover of my new album is from this woman who is a painter, kind of in the style of Andy Warhol. Her paintings sell for thousands of dollars, but she had never done an album cover until I asked, and she said 'sure.'"

In the early days of Old 97's, they were a rollicking, country-rocking, honky-tonking band whose songs mainly involved chasing girls, life on the road and being in a rock band. But Miller always brought a literate playfulness to his songs and the protagonists were usually hopeless or hapless romantics.

Consider "Victoria Lee," which has an opening couplet of: "This is the story of Victoria Lee, She started out with Percodan and ended up with me. ..." Or the popular song "Barrier Reef," where the protagonist cynically recites a litany of things that turn out to be less than advertised: "What's so great about the Barrier Reef? What's so fine about art?" But it turns out all his disillusion is simply because he has a broken heart and if it has its funny nuances, audiences still feel for the poor bloke.

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Miller's solo work tends to show his more sensitive side, and as he has matured, married and had two kids, his subject matter has become more about finding meaning and appreciating lasting love. Songs like "Kiss Me on the Fire Escape" show that hopeless romantic more sure of himself and his feelings. On the new album, the song "Go Through You" seems to be about finding redemption through that lasting love: "They say what doesn't kill you makes you stronger, I no longer think that's true, But I know if I want to get to heaven, I have to go through you. ..."

How does the songsmith decide which songs work best for the band or the solo albums?

"I'm always surprised at what the band gravitates to or rejects," Miller said. "I bring them as much as I can, and whatever they don't want is then my solo stuff. It has been really rewarding for me to be able to alternate because I never have time to get bored doing one or the other. I am able to do other writing too, like my kids book. My one unattainable goal, so far, is long fiction, like writing a novel."

Just because Miller's latest solo album came out last September does not mean his show Friday will center on that material.

"My solo shows are not done touring behind the new records as they come out," he said. "I've been doing the solo tours constantly between Old 97's runs, and I've found over the years that my set list needs to reflect the whole catalog. There are a number of tunes from 'The Instigator' album (2002), for instance, that people still want to hear, probably because that record had millions of dollars of marketing behind it. But I try to perform the music that connects the most and also try to hit every era of the band too. With 20 studio albums out between the band and my solo work, I can't hit each and every one. But I try and represent the most beloved parts of the band's catalog, and my solo albums."

In an interview with Miller after "The Instigator" came out, he talked about the trauma he and his fiancée faced while living three blocks from the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001. His journal from those harrowing days was published in The Atlantic magazine in September 2011, 10 years after the terror attacks. His candid and unflinching account of the aftermath resonated with countless readers. Miller's activities also include working with the Breathe Easy series of annual concerts in Texas to benefit cystic fibrosis research, and helping to promote the Okay to Say programs, which seek to encourage people to share mental health concerns.

"For years I was embarrassed to talk about my own struggles, or concerned it might sound like 'virtue signaling,'" Miller explained. "At a certain point, with my own kids approaching adolescence, I realized honest voices need to be out there. Everyone struggles and more people have to know that, so I overcame my own embarrassment about talking about it. It is never easy, and the most troubling things are not easy, but I am now a little more comfortable talking about it. I'm not that politically active because I never felt qualified, but when it comes to personal mental health challenges, I can speak from experience and maybe help people. ... The best way to do that ... is simply through love, so we should all try to maximize that."

Like the best Miller-penned songs, it's a deceptively simple statement, but one that resonates. Miller's only other New England stop on this tour is Saturday night at The Press Room in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, which is sold out. 

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Upcoming gigs: Grateful Dead show at Hull's C-Note

THURSDAY: The Yacht Lobsters, soft rock from the '70s and '80s, at City Winery. Night Moves, an Americana quartet from Minnesota, at Brighton Music Hall. Babytron rocks The Sinclair.

FRIDAY: The Magic City Hippies offer funk from Miami at The Paradise Rock Club. Duxbury trio The Locals at Soundcheck Studios. Greensky Bluegrass at MGM Grand Theater. Soulja Boy raps at Big Night Live. Bruce in the USA is the tribute at The Sinclair. Roomful of Blues jams at City Winery. Indie rocker Nick Hakim at Brighton Music Hall. Rhode Island blues titans Neal and the Vipers, with Woodstock's Professor Louis and the Crowmatix, get down at The Narrows Center.

SATURDAY: Eric Rachmany, from the reggae band Rebelution, does an acoustic solo show at The Paradise Rock Club. Glen Phillips, from Toad the Wet Sprocket, at City Winery. Funksters Bazookafoot, with The Birch Swart Band, at Soundcheck Studios. Cathedral, a Van Halen tribute, at City Winery. French DJ Klingarde at Big Night Live. Fennario's Grateful Dead show at The C-Note.

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SUNDAY & BEYOND: Sunday, look for Canadian indie-rocker MorMor at The Sinclair, while Green River's Creedence Clearwater revival tribute hits City Winery. Tuesday has Canadian heartland rockers The Trews at Brighton Music Hall. Dustbowl Revival lights up City Winery. Wednesday night, look for Arizona jam band Spafford at Soundcheck Studios.

See Rhett Miller

When: 8 p.m. Jan. 20

Where: The Spire Center, 25½ Court St., Plymouth

Tickets: $32

Info: 508-746-4488 or spirecenter.org

This article originally appeared on The Patriot Ledger: Rhett Miller of Old 97’s comes to Plymouth for solo show Friday