Steve Miller’s ‘WELCOME TO THE VAULT’ Out Now

Renowned guitarist, multi-platinum-selling singer-songwriter, bandleader and Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee Steve Miller has released his rarities box set, WELCOME TO THE VAULT, today via Sailor/Capitol/UMe. WELCOME TO THE VAULT shows Miller opening up his voluminous archive of recordings for the first time ever. The milestone 3CD + DVD box set covers his genre-blurring six-decade career over 52 audio tracks, pairing a number of greatest hits and certifiable rock ‘n roll classics with 38 previously unreleased recordings that span demos, rehearsals, outtakes, vintage concert performances and 5 newly uncovered original Steve Miller Band songs recorded in the 1960s and 1970s. The accompanying DVD collects 21 live performances, among them legendary rare TV appearances and concert videos.

WELCOME TO THE VAULT is accompanied by a 100-page hardbound book of photos, memorabilia and artifacts from Miller’s personal collection, as well as an exclusive 9,000-word essay by renowned rock journalist David Fricke. Steve Miller Band’s WELCOME TO THE VAULT, also available as a 52-track digital collection, arrives Friday, October 11 via Sailor/Capitol/UMe.

Also out today, SELECTIONS FROM THE VAULT spotlights several tracks from the larger WELCOME TO THE VAULT collection. The SELECTIONS FROM THE VAULT CD features 13 tracks, including 12 previously unreleased recordings. The limited edition SELECTIONS FROM THE VAULT clear vinyl LP showcases eight tracks, all of which are previously unreleased.

WELCOME TO THE VAULT opens in 1969 with the Steve Miller Band covering Little Walter’s “Blues With a Feeling” at the Fillmore West in San Francisco, a previously unreleased 10-minute blowout unlike anything else in Miller’s official studio or live catalog. Faithful to the form yet undeniably visionary, the track instantly sets the pace for what is to come. A turbulent “Super Shuffle” recorded live at Steve Miller Band’s breakthrough appearance at 1967’s Monterey Pop Festival, is fast followed by such previously unreleased revelations as an early version of “Going to Mexico” (originally found on 1970’s NUMBER 5) as well as solo acoustic takes on BRAVE NEW WORLD’s “Kow Kow Calculator” and “Seasons,” recorded on the road in 1973.

The evolutionary sessions for 1976’s FLY LIKE AN EAGLE and 1977’s BOOK OF DREAMS – Steve Miller Band’s “multi-platinum fusions of crisp funk and blues undercurrents, progressive-rock electronics and hit-single pith,” according to Fricke – are captured via alternate takes including a striking view of “Fly Like an Eagle” as a 12-minute work-in-progress suite. WELCOME TO THE VAULT further includes a number of alternate versions of iconic Steve Miller Band tracks mostly recorded prior to their commercial releases, and a recent big band reinterpretation of “Take the Money and Run” featuring fellow Texas guitar hero Jimmie Vaughan recorded live at New York’s Jazz at Lincoln Center, where Miller is involved as a performer, educator and curator focusing on blues music.

Indeed, the blues in all its forms can be heard throughout WELCOME TO THE VAULT, in versions of songs of Willie Dixon, Robert Johnson and Otis Rush, as well as country and R&B variations like Roy Acuff’s “Freight Train Blues” and Mickey and Sylvia’s classic “Love Is Strange.” Miller’s own personal links to the lineage and history of guitar music are also prominently featured, including a 1990 version of Jimmy Reed’s “I Wanna Be Loved,” recorded with his close musical friend and godfather, Les Paul, during the electric guitar pioneer’s famed Monday night residency at New York City’s Fat Tuesday’s.

WELCOME TO THE VAULT closes with a pair of landmark tracks also released here for the first time that include Texas blues guitar legend T-Bone Walker performing his 1952 hit, “Lollie Lou,” on a tape made the year before in the Miller Family living room by Steve’s father George, a passionate jazz and blues fan and home recording enthusiast. The collection finishes more than 60 years later with Miller himself performing “Lollie Lou” at “T-Bone Walker: A Bridge from Blues to Jazz,” the December 2016 tribute concert curated by Miller at Jazz at Lincoln Center.

As if all that weren’t enough, the WELCOME TO THE VAULT DVD features 21 incredible live performances, including rare footage from 1967’s Monterey Pop Festival, a Dutch TV filmed performance of the Fillmore West from 1970, a 43-minute September 1973 concert at New York’s Palace Theater broadcast on Don Kirshner’s Rock Concert (unseen since the ’70s), an ABC In Concert performance with James Cotton (1974), a performance of “Abracadabra” from Michigan’s Pine Knob from that album tour in 1982, and selections from Austin City Limits (2011), as well as Miller’s intimate 1990 performance with Les Paul at New York City’s Fat Tuesday’s.

Miller just completed his 2019 60-date national tour with the Steve Miller Band, which culminated with a performance at the closing of the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s world-famous PLAY IT LOUD exhibit, that featured several instruments from his personal collection. Miller will continue his exploration of the blues at New York’s Jazz at Lincoln Center with “Cannonball Adderley and The Blues,” a spirited celebration of saxophone legend Cannonball Adderley. Set for Friday and Saturday, December 13 and 14 at JALC’s Rose Theater, the event will see Miller joined by vocalist Brianna Thomas and the Patrick Bartley Sextet, led by one of NYC’s most acclaimed young saxophonists.

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