New York, NY (Top40 Charts) Pianist / Singer-songwriter Pete Muller has released the second single from his upcoming album More Time, out on May 17th via Two Truths Music. The new track, "Run Out of Love" is a blues drenched, alluring duet with Grammy-winning songwriter Lisa Loeb. The video for the song premieres today with Q Magazine. The album was recorded in
Memphis with producer/engineer Matt Ross-Spang (Jason Isbell, Margo Price).
The bewitching new song reflects our limitless capacity for affection. Muller tells the story of how the duet evolved, "We opened for
Lisa Loeb last summer, and we had a lot of fun touring with her. I love Lisa's voice and was thrilled that she agreed to sing on the album's closing track, 'Run Out of Love.'"
He continues, "Lisa and I worked well together to make the song a duet. She had the cool idea of going back and forth on the third verse, and that's my favorite verse of the song." Reflecting on the song's meaning, Muller concludes, "Some people fear that if they offer love and it's not returned, their love will be depleted. What I've found is that the more you love, the more you're able to love in the future."
"Run Out of Love" comes on the heels of the album's title track which was released in February and accompanied by a beautifully shot video.
Recorded with Ross-Spang in Memphis, More Time marks a dramatic leap forward for Muller, who grapples here with the push and pull of responsibility and desire, commitment and temptation. Muller writes with a candid, daring vulnerability, baring his innermost hopes and fears with unflinching honesty, Where Muller's previous work leaned more towards carefully arranged folk and roots, More Time is an expansive, hard-hitting slice of rock and soul, a shift that comes in part due to Muller's remarkable evolution as an artist and in part due to the all-star band Ross-Spang assembled for the sessions, including celebrated bassist Dave Smith (Al Green, Wilson Pickett), famed
Texas guitarist Will Sexton (Joe Ely, Roky Erickson),
Memphis organist Rick Steff (Lucero, Cat Power), longtime
Wilco drummer Ken Coomer, and a host of local legend horn players and background vocalists.
"I was immediately drawn to the passion Pete brings to every performance," says Ross-Spang, who encouraged Muller to embrace a relaxed, grittier approach in the studio built around live takes and free-flowing improvisation without the rigid constraints of a click track. "Joy truly abounds in his music, and working with Pete reinforced those same feelings in me. I consider myself very lucky to have helped capture that feeling on his new record."
After achieving success as a businessman, Muller found himself yearning to fulfill his creative urges. "I have these two sides," Muller explains. "One part of me is a very practical, analytical thinker, and the other's this creative artist who can't help but express what's going on in his soul. For a long time, I thought I had to choose between the two, but I've realized that I can love and nourish both sides of myself, that it's and not or."
Feeling spiritually drained, Muller began drifting away from his work for a period of similarly intense focus on his music, busking in the subways, playing small clubs and cafes, and writing his own songs for the first time. After releasing a pair of early albums, he got married and became a father. While he eventually returned to the business he'd founded, he remained as dedicated as ever to his craft.
In 2014, he recorded his third album, Two Truths and a Lie, which introduced him to Avatar Studios (a New York landmark previously known as The Power Station, where icons like
Bruce Springsteen and
Bob Dylan had recorded). Upon learning the studio was under threat of being sold and redeveloped as condos, Muller decided to use his resources in partnership with the City of New York and the Berklee College of
Music to save, renovate, and re-launch the space as a world-class recording and educational facility.
He would go on to record his next two albums - 2019's Dissolve and 2022's Spaces - there, launching a whole new chapter of his career that would find him sharing bills with artists like Joan Osborne, Jimmy Webb,
Livingston Tayler, and Paul Thorn in addition to landing festival slots everywhere from Telluride to Montreux.
And if launching a successful business, recording several albums, and saving a landmark studio wasn't enough - the hyper-talented renaissance man also founded the non-profit Live
Music Society to provide grants to independent music venues around the country to help keep their doors open during COVID. Muller has established himself as an artist dedicated to protecting and promoting music and its sacred spaces in addition to perfecting his own craft. On More Time, Muller has harnessed this passion and infused it into his most striking and bold set of songs to date.
