“Afoot and light-hearted I take to the open road,
Healthy, free, the world before me,
The long brown path before me leading wherever I choose.

Henceforth I ask not good-fortune, I myself am good-fortune,
Henceforth I whimper no more, postpone no more, need nothing,
Done with indoor complaints, libraries, querulous criticisms,
Strong and content I travel the open road.

The earth, that is sufficient,
I do not want the constellations any nearer,
I know they are very well where they are,
I know they suffice for those who belong to them.”

- from “Song of the Open Road,” W. Whitman, 1856

John Austen Miller is a songwriter currently residing in Lockhart, Texas.

His debut album, Dust in the Attic, is meant to act as something of a relic; abandoned in a different time long ago for re-discovery when it’s most needed. The songs take on various forms and harmonic changes that aren’t often used in modern songwriting, making them sound both unfamiliar and recognizable at the same time. The journeys through the lives of the main characters in each song leave the listener with their own images, their own interpretations of conflict and resolution, and their own reflections that invite them to look differently at this ever so slightly tilted world all around us.