Jennifer Crighton on Miles

I met Miles when he came to Calgary for Sled Island and worked with him on a Drone Project for Wreck City’s Demo Tape. Akron/Family was the soundtrack to a specific era of my life, and somehow I crossed paths with this human a few key times the way musicians so often do, bumping into each-other at shows and festivals. I was always struck by how open he was, never a snob, just genuinely interested in connecting with those around him in a real way. Then, when he was here for Sled we properly hung out for most of that week off and on, I took him out to Audities where I was working on my first Hermitess LP and we jammed there with the Backhomes one of those evenings. I got the opportunity to tell him in a non-awkward-fan way how those Akron/Family albums had soundtracked a pivotal period in my life, some of those songs almost anthems, and how dear that was to me. We’ve been in contact via sporadic text since then, odd things, ideas about music, stories about Italian food, we last chatted about my quarantine bread making. It was just good knowing Miles was out there in the world, and I looked forward to that unexpected time when we might cross paths again.

I’m so sad he’s gone.