photo courtesy of BJF Media

Album Review of Jason Charles Miller: Cards on the Table (Golden Robot Records)

Jason Charles Miller‘s eighth solo studio album, Cards on the Table, should be an instant classic. It’s hard-rocking, powerful, and catchy. On this disc, Jason combines the angry swamp rock intensity I’ve referenced when reviewing Kristian Montgomery and the Winterkill Band with the sidewinding hard rock power of bands like Love and a .38.

Cards on the Table hits hard from the very opening with kind-of-ominous power rocker “The River” and revs up the energy on persistent, hard-charging “Reckless.” Yet, Jason Charles Miller shows the ability to slow things down effortlessly, too, on the power rock ballad “Day After Day.”

Southern-flavored, explosive rocker “Losing My Way” – my recommendation for the second song to check out on this album, by the way – twists, twangs, and soars, all driven by an incessant straight-ahead rhythmic beat. The first song you should check out? Well, that’s “You’re About To,” a song so filled with attitude you’ll be screaming along with the lyric “If you don’t know by now, you’re about to!” before the end of your first listen.

image courtesy of BJF Media

As much as I love those two songs, though, the first single I’d have released from the album, if I were Miller’s label (and rock radio still ruled the airwaves) would be “Chasing the Sun” (featuring Austin Hanks). It has a twangy Southern rock flair, a sunshine-bright warmth, and some the way-too-cool opening lyrics: “I’m from one of those towns where you leave the windows down, truck’s unlocked outside your place, where the born-to-runs are gone by twenty-one, and the stick-arounds get stuck in their ways.” The perfect song for cruising down the highway with your windows down. And a lot of us grew up in “one of those towns.”

There’s really not a weak song in this collection – even though I’ve skipped a few in my review – but I’d be remiss in not finishing with a mention of the album-ender, Jason’s heartfelt, soft country-rock, by-now (because I’ve taken so long to review the album) critically-acclaimed (and rightfully so!) cover of Iron Maiden’s “Wasted Years.” It’s a mellow-rockin’ friggin’ work of art.

This is probably one of my favorite albums of the last few years. I’ve placed 8 of the 11 tracks on my phone, making them potential selections for my #PhoneOnShuffle playlist. (Twitter/X followers will be familiar with this, a recurring post I’m trying to occasionally feature on Threads too, for variety, though I’m still getting a lot more engagement with it on X. 1,600+ of my favorite songs on shuffle; the phone decides which ones I hear.) So yeah, I think this is a helluva record, and if you’re a rocker, too, I bet you’ll agree.

More Recently

Cards on the Table was a 2023 release. Jason has since released Knives in the Dark, which I’ve only just sampled a few songs from on Spotify. Seems like an excellent ninth release, so after you’ve checked out Cards on the Table (and after it’s become on of your all-time favorite albums), you can join me in looking forward to exploring Knives in the Dark.