with Matt Lunsford
Presented in partnership with the City of Urbana.
Doors 3:30 PM | Show 4:00 PM | ALL AGES | General Admission | FREE
Rob Miller will join Matt Lunsford to discuss his recent book “The Hours are Long but the Pay is Low: A Curious Life in Independent Music.”
Named a “2026 Michigan Notable Book” & one of Rolling Stone’s Best Music Books of 2025.
-Finalist: Richard Frisbie Award for Adult Nonfiction by the Society of Midland Authors
-Runner Up: Gordon Sharpe Americana UK Book Award
“Every page a treasure” — No Depression
“Hits that magic combination of total behind-the-scenes access, coming-of-age wonderment, relatable music lover energy and some really entertaining and descriptive language.”—-Selena Ferguson, Chicago Sun-Times contributor
In 1993, Rob co-founded the independent record label Bloodshot Records in Chicago. Over the next 28 years, I worked to make it in an internationally renowned home for punk-inspired roots music, Americana, and “alt-country.” Working with celebrated artists such as the Old 97s, Neko Case, Robbie Fulks, Scott H. Biram, The Sadies, Sarah Shook & the Disarmers, and the late Justin Townes Earle at the beginning of their careers, established, critically-acclaimed artists like the Bottle Rockets, Detroit Cobras, Wayne “The Train” Hancock, William Elliott Whitmore, Bobby Bare Jr, and Murder By Death, as well as important musicians that had an early impact on him like Graham Parker, Alejandro Escovedo, Barrence Whitfield, Exene Cervenka, Dex Romweber, and R&B icon Andre Williams, Miller had an almost 30-year run in Chicago’s vibrant music scene. Through it all, the label remained fiercely independent, resisting efforts to pigeonhole their sound or succumb to the music industry’s hit machine mentality.
Written with wry self-deprecation, the book is a musical coming of age story that treads the line between memoir and history, and is full of anecdotes, cautionary tales, and a from-the-trenches perspective on the workings of underground music. It hits the highs, the lows, the harsh realities, and the acts of creative enthusiasm that defied common business practices. And, at its heart it is a celebration of indie communities, and an appeal to appreciate and strengthen them.
“I have never read better descriptions of what it meant to “search for” the music you needed, and how difficult, DIY and exciting that search can be.” — Neko Case
“I found Rob Miller’s journey through the music industry fascinating and fun, and when not giggling I was laughing out loud. While obvious in hindsight, the marriage of punk and country was anything but. Yet Miller and his cohorts identified with the punk attitude coursing through many of their favorite bands in Chicago’s underground country scene and thought they could help introduce their music to a wider audience. The musical husbandry of Bloodshot Records produced many musical masterpieces over the next twenty-five years. Bloodshot made the world a better place, and Miller was at the center of it all.”— Jeff Nelson, Minor Threat and cofounder of Dischord Records
“Rob Miller’s book The Hours Are Long, But the Pay Is Low delivers a gripping insider’s account of a truly special moment in music and culture. Thanks, Rob, for living to tell the tale.”— Rhett Miller, Old 97’s
