When I was in high school, a Marlboro beach towel or jean jacket was the mark of a real scumbag. If one of your friends had something like that, it was proof that they'd saved up their Marlboro Miles — coupons that came with each pack of smokes, which you could cash in for all sorts of scuzzy merch. Camel had something similar with Camel Cash, but Marlboro Reds were the true bad-kid cigarettes.
Our society has gone downhill since then in all sorts of ways, but at least tobacco companies don't have such an easy time marketing their wares to children who wanted to broadcast their rebelliousness. (If there's a vape-cartridge equivalent for Marlboro Miles, I am blissfully unaware of it.) Next month, the Lancaster, Pennsylvania band American Motors will release Functional Music, the new album of noisy, ominous music that they recorded with Jawbox legend J Robbins. We already posted lead single "No Horses," which made it onto one of our weekly best-songs lists. Today, the band shares their clangorous, laconic new song "Marlboro Miles," which glows with its own kind of dangerous appeal.
Here's what band member Dustin White says about it: A single without a chorus? In the times before thrift stores just threw out all photos and slides, I found a photo of a woman laying in a bed surrounded by Marlboro Miles. It could’ve been Camel Cash, but I’m 100% sure it was some sort of cigarette-related currency.
Sadly, that photo is lost to the abyss that is multiple cross country moves, time, and a general "fuck it" attitude, but it lives in my mind. The first verse deals with a science fiction convention that takes place in Columbus, Ohio that we used to party at every year. I saw a Star Wars Stormtrooper and a Klingon make out there once.
This song feels like the connective tissue between our first record and the new one. It seems like a good way to signal that not everything on the record has big pop moments and plenty of it still exists in the same murky reverb drenched hit then pause world that we love. This one is really fun to play live.
Amanda Lee McCarty, aka Clotheshorse, directed the "Marlboro Miles" video, and it's below. Functional Music is out 11/6 via The Ghost Is Clear/Expert Work/Vina.
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