Band formed out of loss comes home to Ephrata

EPHRATA — The boys – and girl – are back in town.

The band Millergold, four of whose members graduated from Ephrata High School, will perform two shows in their hometown this weekend. The first show will be Friday evening at Ephrata High School’s Performing Arts Center, and the second will be Saturday at 12 Hawks Sports Bar & Grill.

“We did Cabaret at (EHS) and really loved music,” said Nate Elliott, the band’s bass player and a 2015 EHS graduate. “We did choir, and then kind of went our separate ways for about 10 years.”

Then in 2023, Nate and his wife Bailey lost their 3 1/2-year-old son Miller in an accident. That was the trigger to pick up music again, he said.

“I hadn’t ever played the bass before,”: Elliott said. “I played piano and stuff, but I picked up the bass and said, ‘We should start a band.’ My wife started writing music Tucker (Merchant, Bailey’s brother) plays the drums, my wife plays guitar and sings, and we got into our basement in Liberty Lake and started jamming on some stuff.”

Besides the Elliotts and Merchant, Millergold includes 2013 EHS graduate Kieran Rolfe on guitar and backing vocals, and guitarist George Brunt, who is the only non-Tiger in the group.

Millergold’s sound is best described as “grief rock,” Elliott said. Most of the songs deal with themes of loss and bereavement, with titles like “Goodbye,” “Missing You” and “Left Behind.” It’s a way of expressing the sorrow of losing a child, Elliott said.

“The majority of our songs are really rooted in trying to feel what it means to lose someone that means the world to you and to deal with those emotions,” Elliott said. “It has been kind of a project about dealing with loss and working through those feelings.”

The band’s name comes from Miller and the fact that he loved marigolds, Elliott said. Miller loved music and wanted to be a rock star when he grew up.

Millergold recently finished recording its first album, Elliott said, which will be released in the spring. The performances Friday and Saturday will showcase the songs on the album, all original. The show at the high school is for all ages, but the performance at 12 Hawks is only for 21 and over.

“People have told us that grief is love with nowhere to go,” Elliott said. “This is us trying to try to put it somewhere. We know that we’re not the only people that have experienced loss and I think that while not everyone’s lost a kid, most people have lost somebody important to them. So I think it really resonates with people.”

Millergold

7 p.m. Friday, Feb. 28 at Ephrata High School, 718 Frey Road Northwest. $15 adults, $5 students

7:30 p.m. Saturday, March 1 at 12 Hawks Sports Bar & Grill, 140 Division Ave. S., Ephrata. Tickets $12, adults only

    Millergold takes its name from founders Nate and Bailey Elliott’s son Miller, who died in an accident in 2023 at the age of 3 1/2.