I'll Get His Coat

I must admit, when i got on the site this morning and saw the news of the passing of my friend Tony Miller I was stunned. So many emotions and memories in the short time I knew him (five very short years). While never meeting Tone face to face I somehow feel like I knew him as well as one could given the circumstances. Perhaps a bit misguided in my thinking but there is something about sharing your music on a site like this, getting to know the man through both his music and some personal chats I've had with him over the years to participate, even in some small form in his life and be a better human being for knowing you. I know Tony battled his demons of depression and self doubt that on occasion would make him doubt what his purpose was in life (a common battle we both have shared about), but it that very vulnerability and his ability to rise above it that he could put on display in both our "conversations" and his music that gave me the feeling of my great gratitude for having known the man. I know if there is an afterlife of some kind, he is perhaps spending some time meeting and renewing his love of those in his life that went before him (his old man for one). Funny, he's been one of the most beloved artists/people by so many on the site and yet that while I never met him face to face, I feel I got to know him intimately or at least as intimately as one can in any that circumstance. The wonderful thing about Tony is I think I had a clear picture of who he was as displayed in those lyrics, music and performances, which was a wonderful human being that will never be forgot in mind or many others' in the world because of the priceless gift of his music. Every time I hear one of his songs, I may feel a bit of sadness at the beginning, perhaps a tear or two occasionally, but ultimately a smile will come to my face as having known the man whom I have always admired being able to create and bring a special picture of life with those words, music and yes, that voice. Music is such a wonderful tool and for me, while one of it's reasons for being is to entertain, with Tony it was so much more. It was a way of telling everyone who he was and he could lay bare that whether with humor or heart
wretching brilliance in his creations. I was never able to travel to the UK to visit him, so perhaps I will visit him in another "location" someday to shake his hand and give him a hug. Going to miss you till then you Strat playing fool. Say hello to George and John for me and the rest of your contemporaries. And most of all, thanks for the so many memories I have of you that will allow me to keep you in my head and heart forever.....

Your friend....

Dan

[tbwig]

Hi Dan,
Appreciated your words about Tony. Thanks for sharing.
Just wondered whether others might add memories, encounters, quips, exchanges....pass the coat around the room. Just a thought.

I'll take Tony's coat from you and offer a story from me:
My first comment from Tony was on a song that had some close harmony vocals and Tony sagely suggested I was out by, what I now call "Tony's 2 cents"...he was right... but alas I was too proud to be anything but indignant...live and learn...and be humble...Let Tony chime in his "2 cents"...in music analysis he was often blunt ...but often right
Details...he seemed to get the details...in his own masterfully crafted compositions and in others.

Anyway, that's a bit from me. Who wants Tony's coat next?

RIP Tony

All the best,
Terry

[Amadeus]

Hey Everyone,
I remember chatting to Tony on the very first day he came to the site. Being a guitar player myself we hit it off straight away and I could tell that he knew what he was talking about. I was really surprised by the amount of quality tracks he put out, it seemed like he was always totally immersed in writing and recording. We both struggled with similar demons from time to time and I have to say that the PM's I got from him were always supportive and a great help. As you know, running things isn't my strong point, Tony helped in the background more than a lot of you might know. He was a very fair guy who intensely disliked any form of cyber bullying or disrespect and he quite often took trolls and flamers down a peg or two and requested their removal from the site.
He was also a very funny guy with a razor sharp wit and a multi-spectrum sense of humour (much like his wide range of musical influences). All you have to do is look through his posts here in the forum and you will see clever multi-layered humor through most of what he said. "I'll get my coat" has become a trademark expression and something that will always make me smile.
Anyone who knows his stuff can see how he matured (not sure if that's the right word!) into an excellent producer and all around musician over the past few years.
Anyway, I was really shocked to hear of his passing as I hadn't been in touch with him for a while and had no idea he was ill. Not sure if his family will ever read this (maybe his brother Gilbert might), if they do though I would like to say it was a privilege to have known Kev and to have shared his journey over the past couple of years.
RIP Tony Miller
Dave

[FXMAN]

If im being honest i think we both only ever spoke once or twice to one and other.. there where a few thank you pms on my part to him and vice versa.

i loved his music even though i didnt go to his page as much has i would of liked too leave my words for his music.


from his replies back to me. i got warmth and kindness from his words, so im guessing he was like that in life.. and he was straight to the point too. some trancers i made , he'd pull me up on levels and stuff . but he,d only pm me, bless him.. He was a Gent .. Hope i was one back to him.

My thought's go out to his Family and Friend's .

RIP Tony Miller... God Bless

Neil.

[DJC]

Tony's talent impressed me the moment I first heard him, I remember thinking "what is this guy doing here, unsigned?" The way he reached out to so many of us here with honesty, clarity and compassion in his comments on our material made a reputation for him as well. Unashamed to say I wept several times yesterday thinking of him, listening to his songs and missing, missing, missing my friend. So long, Tony...I'll be looking for you and that coat when my time comes.

[Vin]

I'll remember Tony for his great music and as a kind person, I remember a pm from him once about a song he did called Kathy Said, I told him how it reminded me of an old girl friend and he wanted to know the year and was concerned it may have been the same girl LOL, I really got a laugh out of that.
He has left behind so many great songs to enjoyed and I'll listen to him often.
Rest in Peace Tony Miller.

[Erik Jurado]

Tony was the first person here to reach out to me. I had about 5 months worth of experience at the time and just finished a song called, "America Is Not What It Seems," and Tony said he really liked it and wanted to mix it for me. I sent him all of the files that he asked for and then sat back and waited to see what he could do with them. A couple of days later he asked me what I was using to record with and to get rid of it and then introduced me to the concept of using some kind of timing to play along to, like a click track, a metronome... SOMETHING!!! HAHAHAHA! Then he suggested that I change my method of recording from guitar first to drums and bass first. Next came the tips for basic mixing - I stopped mixing drums on the left and bass on the right! He also sent me a list of compression settings and eq ranges to go by. He was so helpful to me when I was so bad at making music, and he treated me like I was a regular dude who just didn't know the basics, rather than treating me like I was an annoying pain in the ass!

And when I would listen to his songs they were always different. I learned not to predict what each new song of his would be about, because whenever I thought I could figure out what he was going to sound like it was always totally different. I even started making my music with his voice in my head -even though I read all of the words that he used to teach me. When I'd listen to a playback of something I recorded, I'd listen through his ears to try and reduce the possibility of being critiqued on that particular issue - which I still always appreciated - that friendly honesty, which was only meant to help make me better. I stopped leaning on him so much after a while, but I'd always respected him to the fullest. His writing was phenomenal, he was willing to learn from everyone and everything around him, he had a great sense of humor, he wasn't full of himself, I could keep going the more I think of his music, his posts, his comments on my music, his comments on others' music - he was a great member of this site - HALL OF FAME material.

Rest in Peace, Tony Miller. Your name will always bring a smile to my face.


Your Friend,

Erik

[KtA]

Tony was still a relative ''newbie'' back in 2009,when I joined this site,but he was one of the first to welcome me aboard.
He was always a gentleman,as has already been mentioned...feet firmly on the ground,never too busy to answer my message's and offer advice or even give away little production techniques,always willingly.
A rarity nowadays in such a gifted soul...to share one's vast knowledge like that,for no gain.
I've always compared Tony's music to a wolf in sheep's clothing.Dark lyrical content,presented in his own inimitable and engaging style.
I'm guessing he had his fair share of demons...

He also had a wickedly dark sense of humour...which I will sorely miss...


R.I.P mate

[Snidcyco]

As prompted by Terry Wigmore on Dan's thread, here are a few anecdotes about the Tony I knew:

I'm with DJC. It had been quite some since I last cried from a pain felt deep down inside (I'm not talking about drunken tears from some maudlin moment in a movie which are forgotten by the time the credits roll), but the floodgates really opened yesterday when Tony's brother Gilbert messaged me about what had happened, and those gates are still threatening to burst every heartfelt comment I read from one of the people whose lives he touched and who miss him so much. Hell, I'm welling up right now as I type...

I haven't done an awful lot of collaborations on mp3u - there are so many artists I would love to work with, so many suggestions for collabs I've offered out and been given to me which got shelved indefinitely for "later". How we tend to forget how quickly time flies.

But the first collab I ever did on mp3u was with none other than Tony. After asking his advice he took a song of mine which I had mixed, remixed, uploaded, re-uploaded, generally kicked and battered around my software "studio" until it was barely recognisable and each incarnation was worse than the last, and somehow - somehow - he made it shine.

The background music was all exactly the same, no structural rearrangement, as were the lyrics (word-for-word), although he sang them in a completely different way and over different parts of the song than I had, as well as adding his unique experimental lead guitar licks.

Chaotic as all this may sound, what emerged was a much, much better song than the original. In hindsight my song was too sterile and rigid for the Funk genre I intended to have a go at. Tony's version gave it the quirkiness it needed and the response was clear - everyone preferred it, including me.

He even went on to say it was one of the songs he had had the most fun working on. Well at least, that's what he told me...

I've been thinking about re-releasing the song on the main page as a tribute to Tony, but I am not going to include a link to it in this post. It just wouldn't feel right to post a direct plug to a song - even a Tony collab - on this thread.

As Sapphire said in the chatbox, there were other possible Tony collabs I also now wish I had followed up. One was for a punk/metallish song he uploaded where I suggested to him that the vox perhaps weren't gruff enough and offered to re-record some more "raw" vocals for him. He immediately said go for it, but I never followed it up... The reason being that I realised there was little chance of my vox sounding better than his, since he had sung into a professional mic and I didn't have one... (and he had a great ear for that kind of thing).

In fact, the bane of my songs has always been my vocal quality, because I can't be arsed putting aside time to shop for a real mic and stubbornly continue to sing directly into my PCs built-in mic out of lazy convenience...

My ridiculously unprofessional attitude was once offered a remedy by a very generous site member, who had a spare mic and offered to give it to me for free. All I had to do was pay for postage and packaging. Of course I was taken aback by the generosity, but in the end refused because I live in Japan and he in the UK, so P&P might have ended up costing more than buying a new mic.

What was the name of that generous guy?... Yep. A guy called Tony Miller...

I regretted it afterwards and once, quite a while later, asked him if he still had it and was willing to sell it to me this time plus P&P but, unfortunately, he said he no longer had it as it had apparently "walked" from his studio...

Of course, as so often is the pattern in life, at that point I regretted not accepting the original offer even more.

I guess I was lucky to have been quite close friends with Tony and Gilbert on Facebook. Hell, even my father befriended Tony's bro and the 4 of us sometimes shot the breeze on the same threads. Over the last year, I probably communicated with Gilbert more than Tony, but it's completely understandable. He had more important things on his mind (and a huge battle to be fought) than prattling about mundane matters and having surreal humorous exchanges.

But when he did post, he never lost any of his sense of humour. He never publicly complained about his personal situation or fished for sympathy from anyone.

I was going to close by saying I wish I had met him in person, and of course I do, but is that really a necessity in the internet age, to get to know someone? I don't think so. I believe you can get to really know people on the net, because even if these physical shells which enclose our souls never meet and shake hands, our minds do meet and interact here on the internet.

I am honoured to have been even a tiny part of your life, Tony, and feel doubly honoured that you have been a part of mine.

With much love and respect,


Phil.

[Lodato]

But he didn't leave. Now he's waring that old coat all the time I guess... Tony for me, stood out from the get go when I joined this site in 2009. I know he talked a lot of George Harrison, but what I heard in his music was Pink Floyd. He would get a little peed that I often made the comparison so I said it all the more just to piss him off. Tony and I did one collab and I re posted it as a tribute to him. I'm not looking for votes or chart toppers as I don't believe they matter. But I wanted folks to hear how sensitive he was with even the slightest touch of his strings. I was honored then that he played on my track and still feel honored now for his gift. I still have a piece he sent me to sing on but that never happened as he had his vocal on it and wanted to replace his with mine but I told him his vocal was beautiful on it so I didn't do it. Still won't Tony! We'll leave the track a mystery.

Tony up above.. I'll get me coat!