niceness in the nineties: An Indie Music Memoir - Softcover

For general release MARCH 23rd, 2011. Jim Miller was a touring guitarist and songwriter in the bands Black Angel's Death Song and Trash Can School in the early to mid nineties. In the latter half of that decade he was a band manager and a promoter for the legendary downtown L.A. dive Al's Bar. At its core, this memoir is a club level look at the rise and fall of the music phenomenon known as grunge.

Jim Miller (James Edward Robert) was born in Chicago on August 9th, 1960. He was raised just six blocks from White Sox Park. Inspired by the punk scene of the late seventies he picked up a guitar and soon learned he could write songs. In the early eighties he was in a band called The New Balladeers, an anti-synthesizer project ala REM and The Violent Femmes. By early 1985 he was in Los Angeles seeking fame and fortune. This memoir recounts his exploits in the West Coast music scene. Playing in two touring bands (Black Angel's Death Song and Trash Can School), he was along for the ride at many great shows and events in and around the "grunge" scene. All the familiar names (Nirvana, Hole) are there along with many more bands you may be unfamiliar with, but whom he hopes you will check out after reading about them. He also hopes you will enjoy reading Niceness in the Nineties.