Elvie Shane Takes Fans on the Road in Autobiographical ‘Miles’ Video [Exclusive Premiere]
In October 2021, then-newcomer Elvie Shane notched his first-ever No. 1 single with “My Boy,” a heart-rending tune penned from his real-life perspective of being a stepdad. With his heart on his sleeve and an honest story to tell, Shane is giving fans a further glimpse into his life in the music video for his song, “Miles (With My Mama)” premiering exclusively via Taste of Country.
The autobiographical track appears on Shane’s 2021 BBR Music Group/Wheelhouse Records debut album, Backslider. The seven-minute tune, which Shane wrote with Jonathan Sherwood and Luke Preston, is very personal to him. It opens with stirring strings before lyrically chronicling a fragment of the singer’s life journey over a gradual tempo build-up.
“Put eighteen hours on eighteen wheels / With little white pills nippin’ at your heels / Like some outlaw asphalt cowboy in the wind / Ridin’ high till you run out / It's an uphill battle just gearing down / Trying to get somewhere on a road that just don't end / Racing time and losing miles you'll never get back again,” he sings in the candid chorus over mid-tempo guitar lines.
“'Miles' was written as a tribute to my dad who is an old-school truck driver. [It was] inspired heavily by ‘Cats in the Cradle,’ a song we used to listen to a lot when riding around,” Shane tells Taste of Country. “‘Miles’ is about sacrifice and finding a balance between what we love and who we love. It’s about growing up.”
It’s precisely these life-inspired moments that take root in the track’s storytelling, which Shane and his co-writers deliberately crafted to be “very straightforward and honest.”
“In verse one, you see my Pops preparing for another trip, but feeling the pain of missing family to do what he loves. Verse two shines a light on resentment that I can develop within family back at home and the importance of making time for them. [And] verse three is the realization of how similar my life on the road for music is to his life on the road in a truck,” Shane explains.
In the accompanying cinematic clip, fans are invited on a voyage with Shane as he traverses the country to take multiple stages, perform his music and meet fans from all walks of life. Both literally and figuratively, it’s the “miles” he's trekked that have allowed the humble Caneyville, Ky., native to reach these career milestones.
Shane is currently touring across the country to promote Backslider, which includes the RIAA Gold-certified “My Boy” and its chest-thumping follow-up single, “Country Roads.” Shane hopes this anthemic number brings listeners back to the "glory days" of their "first love, first drink, [and] first heartache," while also inspiring retrospective gratitude for all of it.
“It’s about mistakes made in youth and hard lessons learned. Oh, and maybe a speeding ticket,” he quips.
Looking ahead, the Wheelhouse Records singer-songwriter has teased that new music is currently in the works, along with more exciting things that he can’t quite spill the beans on just yet.
“There’s a couple projects I’ve been invited to be a part of that I’m excited to get out there in the world, but that’s all I can say about that,” Shane teases.
In the meantime, fans can catch the avid country performer “tearing up on the road” at various festivals, clubs, and shows this summer. For a full list of tour dates, visit Shane’s official website.