Following a break for the Christmas period, Miles returned to the studio to demo and record more tracks although in mid-January he appeared on BBC Choice's The Loafers programme where he talked about his current work and also performed two new tracks - the much-acclaimed 'The Slow Drowning' and 'Everything Is Not Okay'.

Following logistical problems with the 'Common Threads' album, GIG Records announced that they would be withdrawing the album from direct sale and re-releasing it on a commercial basis.   The re-release would be markedly different to the original with the DJ introduction edited out, all references to the supported charity removed, the running order corrected (as 'Your Latest Innuendo' and 'Fixer' were included in the wrong order) and the artwork, originally by Vic Reeves, replaced.

To further differentiate the album from it's predecessor, it was also given a new title although this continually changed right up to it's planned release date from it's original 'Common Threads Live' to 'By The Time I Got To Jersey' via 'Shaven And Toot Sweet' and the simple 'Miles Hunt Live'.  Artwork for the album also went through a number of different designs and variations.

More live dates were announced for March and April, beginning with Miles' first appearances in Ireland since 1992's Feile Festival with The Wonder Stuff which would then be followed by more dates in the US and Canada. It was also announced that Miles and Malc's working relationship had, for the time being, come to an end. Instead, for the US dates, guitarist/vocalist Phil Hurley (former of Gigolo Aunts) would be taking over the guest role.

Shortly before the tour was due to start, Miles played a warm-up gig in the front bar of Ronnie Scott's in Birmingham. The gig featured tracks from the new album along with more Wonder Stuff and Vent compositions. In an extension from the previous gigs where Miles has primarily played album-based material, these dates saw more B-side recordings being aired including Vent 414's 'Give It Whole' and the Stuffies' 'Room 512...' - both tracks which had been requested on numerous occasions at previous performances.

Support for the show was from Carina Round who had already supported Miles on some of his previous UK acoustic shows.  Miles has always taken an interest in new talent since the days of his For All The Right Reasons label and Carina had been a regular support fixture on Miles' UK dates since they met.

Their working relationship increased further after they re-recorded one of Miles tracks intended for his debut album.  'Four To The Floor' was originally a monologue from Miles to a former girlfriend.   Miles' girlfriend of the time knew Carina and suggested to her that she write some answer verses to Miles' originals from a woman's perspective.  After hearing her new lyrics, Miles and Carina went into the recording studio with Martin Bell to record the new version.  The re-recording was not completed in time for the release of his first album and although it was later briefly made available on an album by GIG Records, it was subsequently withdrawn from issue and is unlikely to ever be made available in the future.

Taking new material and old to Ireland, Miles played four dates which went down exceptionally well. Though Vent 414 had not toured there at all and The Wonder Stuff had only played one-day festivals there after the 1989 tour, the crowds knew the older tracks if nothing else and they soon picked up the new songs.

In between returning from Ireland and flying off to America, Miles also squeezed another low-key UK performance in at London's Monarch. Support was again from Carina Round and the set-list continued to include new material from the album and other Wonder Stuff/Vent 414 gems.

Back over to America and once more Miles, with assistance from Phil this time around, appeared to be entertaining the audiences with many venues selling well.  Though he now concentrated more on tracks from his forthcoming album, Miles still included some Wonder Stuff and Vent material.  The only downside of the tour was in Los Angeles where, shortly before playing in the infamous Viper Room, someone stole everything out of their parked-up hire car leaving them with only the clothes and possessions they had on them. After a few quick emergency calls, including one to Adam Duritz of Counting Crows, the duo were able to borrow guitars and clothing to allow them to continue with the night's show but the following night's performance was cancelled to allow Miles, Phil and GIG's David Smith to travel to Seattle to meet with friends and make suitable replacement arrangements.

Miles' commercial debut album, 'Hairy On The Inside', was released in America by GIG at the start of April.  Continuing (in parts) with Miles' current acoustic trend, additional instrumentation on the album was provided by Malc Treece and also included contributions from another former Stuffie - the album's production engineer was none other than Martin 'Fiddly' Bell so it seemed futile not to use him to his full extent whilst in the studio hence the addition of violin, mandolin and piano to some tracks.

Although three of the tracks had already been previously released on the 'Miles Across America' CD, new versions had been recorded for the 'Hairy...' album.  The remaining tracks were all new compositions although the final unlisted track on the album, 'Send Me Onions', had originally penned by Miles during the final days of The Wonder Stuff.

The biggest challenge was to decide exactly what tracks to release on the album.  With Miles having recording so prolifically during the past twelve months he had enough material for at least two full length albums, in addition to the tracks that had been written and recorded during the final period of Vent 414.

Indeed, Miles' initial track listing for the album which he had presented to GIG Records had a different running order and three extra tracks to that which Miles eventually presented them with.  Of the unused tracks, 'How Long Was I Asleep' had originally appeared on Vent 414's demo tape for their second album and the actual title track of the album itself was also decided against.  Even the sleeve design for the album kept changing right up to it's release date - the centre page of the CD booklet originally showed the lyrics for the un-used 'Hairy On The Inside' track (featuring lines such as 'All rise for the man with the four-letter fuck-you eyes').  These were removed at a very late stage when it was felt they served no purpose if the track wasn't being included on the album.

Following the US tour, Miles took a brief break before beginning a mammoth 32-date UK tour.  Starting in Greenock in Scotland, Miles' tour bought him down the length of the British Isles pausing for a four-night residency at Birmingham's Ronnie Scott's Club - a location which he has been quoted as saying was one of his time favourite venues.  He also appeared at London's Fleadh Festival in July and returned to Ronnie Scott's during August as part of their annual Songwriter's Festival.

As the tour drew to a close, Miles hinted that his period of being a solo performer may soon be over.  After the UK tour had finished, he planned to returning to London with a view to recruiting 'like-minded souls' to form a proper group.  By the end of the tour, it became clear that the members of the group had already been approached and had attended some of the UK shows to watch their prospective front-man performing.  After attending some showcase performances for GIG Records in New York, the group planned to hide themselves away for an undisclosed period of time to write, rehearse and record totally new material.

His plans were not to work out though.  In September it emerged that one of the members had pulled out of the project forcing Miles to temporarily shelve his plans.  He did, however, announce a special one-off performance at Sheffield's Corporation Club at the beginning of October as part of a week-long series of event being sponsored by BBC Radio 2.

Following Miles' date in Sheffield, it was widely thought that he would be returning to his Shropshire home for more writing and demoing.  Not so...  During his time in Vent 414, Miles had also hosted a handful of DJ nights at some of the clubs in the Midlands.  Over two years since his last DJ-ing appearance, it was announced that he would be the special guest DJ at Wolverhampton's Civic Hall at the end of October.   It was also announced that he would be headlining at London's Borderline Club in December before appearing as the support act for legendary punk outfit The Buzzcocks when they appeared at Birmingham's Irish Centre a few days later.  Other UK support dates were also scheduled.

Stretching his talents further, Miles found time to working on the other side of the production desk.  Phoenix, a new signing to the Blind Panic record label in the UK, approached Miles in October to record some tracks for them.  He agreed and along with former Stuffies producer, Pat Collier, worked with the group in their London studios during November.  Although a number of tracks were recorded, only one single was ever released by the group.

Whilst in London he also spent some time with one of the members of the aborted group line-up, Phil Lunn (formerly of Birmingham group Capiche).  For a few days, the duo played together in studio space they shared with critically-acclaimed London group 'A' (managed by Martin Gilks).  At the end of their time together, Miles returned home before beginning his brief trip around England for his last solo tour of the Millennium.

At the beginning of December, GIG Records announced the creation of Miles Hunt's MP3 Club.  The subscription-based club would provide it's members with fifteen downloadable tracks in MP3 format during the twelve months of 2000.  All of the material would be totally exclusive to the club, some were new tracks and others were unreleased demos by both himself and Vent 414.  As a special bonus, the last track was a live recording of 'Fisherman's Blues' - performed live by The Wonder Stuff during their 1994 tour.  Although the latter track eventually re-appeared on an official Wonder Stuff album at Polydor's insistence, some of the tracks have since been made available on subsequent releases but not in the versions that were available to subscribers.  GIG Records also provided full-colour artwork and specially written liner notes by Miles so that the tracks could be used as a normal audio CD for people not wishing to listen to them solely via their computers.