Steve Gunn

This dude made one of my favorite records in 2012 (the Gunn-Truscinki LP Ocean Parkway) and one of my favorite records so far in 2013 (Time Off). He totally deserves his own thread!
here are a few things to check out
http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Steve_Gunn/
http://threelobed.bandcamp.com/album/boerum-palace
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z_mXTXzyiyc

nice new interview here: http://www.aquariumdrunkard.com/2013/06/05/wooden-wand-interviews-steve-gunn/
I like this: "imagine the Dead’s “Bird Song” performed by guys who know all the Sun City Girls records by heart"

steve gunn rules!
that interview is a really good read.

Will try to contribute more to this thread once I have heard the new record!

Ian, you may be the best person to answer this question: what GHQ stuff is worth tracking down, and what direction in the whole drone/improv/noise/guitar players doing guitarry shit do they fall under? The core was Pete Nolan and Marcia Basset and Steve, right? Which is an intriguing crew, but I have never heard or seen any records.

this is the only GHQ i have, but I'd like to get more -- it's pretty killer. http://threelobed.bandcamp.com/album/crystal-healing

Aww thanks man, will try to get to that later today. It's been raining for like 24 hours straight, looks like good afternoon listening for a moody grey day for sure.

be careful on that three lobed bandcamp site, i end up spending $$$ whenever I'm there!

Yeah, that label is cool as hell. I am married though, and these days my money does not flow very freely. Gotta build up a list of wants, and then I buy shit direct from people playing in town when I can, but I am due for some new records for sure.

i actually really liked the GHQ record on Not Not Fun... "California Night Burning Dreams." It's pretty cheap on Discogs.. man, looking there, there are a lot of CDrs! GHQ stuff never did it for me the way Gunn's solo stuff does tbh, definitely in more of a droning/jamming/improv mood.

there is a tape on our shelf in the hallways labled "GHQ REHEARSAL" and i wonder what it sounds like.

Hah, give it a listen! Thanks for the recs.

this one actually seeems interesting too --
http://www.discogs.com/GHQ-Pale-Heat-Of-Summer/release/1122219

because it's has trucsinski on drums and no pete nolan. i wonder if it has the sandy bull-ish flavor of those gunn/truscinski records or is its own animal..

nice recent radio session here: http://thekey.xpn.org/2013/06/12/the-key-studio-sessions-steve-gunn/
tho i think they have the song titles mixed up?
whatever, this band sounds killer -- hope they make it to my neck of the woods sometime!

this is pretty sweet -- http://www.aquariumdrunkard.com/2013/08/14/desert-heat-cat-mask-at-huggie-temple/
basically gunn-truscinski duo + cian nugent.

Yeah, checked that out and dug it a bunch. Gotta listen again with some fresh ears, but boy am I a sucker for guitar interplay (when it is of a high caliber).

Yeah man, some cool trading of foreground/background roles on this.

you see this too? very good
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uCDbPdzvS04

Yeah, saw that a bit ago. Good stuff. Really hope Gunn and C. Forsyth make it my way on some upcoming tours, especially with their groups. I like both solo but wanna hear their bands live.

new one coming out in october ---
A heady and elliptical travelogue, Way Out Weather demonstrates a radical widescreen evolution, featuring a larger band and lighting out for lusher, more expansive and impressionistic territories than the critically acclaimed Time Off (2013). This is the virtuosic guitarist and songwriter’s career-defining statement to date, a self-assured masterpiece that completes Gunn’s satisfying transformation into a mature songwriter, singer, and bandleader of subtlety and authority. The record features longtime musical brothers Jason Meagher, Justin Tripp, and John Truscinski, in addition to newcomers Nathan Bowles (Black Twig Pickers, Pelt); James Elkington (Freakwater, Jeff Tweedy); Mary Lattimore (Thurston Moore, Kurt Vile); and Jimy SeiTang (Psychic Ills, Rhyton.)

still on paradise of bachelors?

yes indeed. heard a new one on a live recording called "tommy's congo" that I've listened to like 100 times.

:D

Very much looking forward to this!!

http://media.paradiseofbachelors.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/PoB-15-SG-WOW-front-jacket.jpg

kurt vile and war on drugs fans of the past few years really need to get on this

the ending of tommy's congo is kind of odd, like it actually stops, when it seemed like it had to go on for 20 minutes or fade out or something

after a few repetitions it doesn't sound so 'african' any more

yeah this is great

Man, go see this band live if you get a chance. On tour right now and all of the songs opened up amazingly well live. The record is great, no doubt, but they pull all of it off and then some in a live context. The guitar interplay (Jim Elkington, who plays on the record, is touring as the second guitarist/lap steel player) is awesome.

As I touched on in the other thread- you could pretty much bring anyone along to this show and they'd probably be pretty enamored.

Man, I tried to get a whole bunch of folks to the show here with that in mind. It was actually a pretty great turnout for this town (and the venue in particular), but the band should appeal to all kinds of folks that weren't there. Gotta say that it is nice to see them at this level though, I was front and center with zero distractions, i.e., everyone there was super into the show and quiet while the band played, no dead weight audience-wise at all.

Man, I would love to see this band. Last time I saw Jim Elkington was when he was fronting the Zincs and opening for the Sea and Cake and he was totally ace.

Too bad they're coming anywhere near me.

*they're NOT

live show here: http://nblo.gs/10EnFZ

I didn't expect that!!!!!!!!!! YESSSS

Sweet! Psyched to check this out (i.e. I just started streaming it .....) Nice sound at the outset, digging in.

Oh man this show is good. "Way Out Weather" is flooring me right now ....

yeah, this show/recording smokes

Similar to your experience (set list etc) though?

xp

Yeah, the three set lists from this tour I have seen have all been about the same. Performance I saw was exactly the same sequence-wise, but "Tommy's Congo" and "Way Out Weahter" were flipped and we didn't get to see "The Lurker". Performances similar, but of course they are riding the energy and improvising differently. This NYC show definitely smokes as Tyler puts it, but so did the show I saw. Just a damn good band.

new tune/video!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VsG0kDv2EGs&feature=youtu.be

It's ok, kinda sounds like a slightly more measured version of the recent jammy solo Malkmus stuff. Maybe that's Matador's fault?

yeah definitely the poppiest thing he's done so far ... think i dig it though.

i really wanna like this dude but i just cant get down with the vocals

what's wrong with them? too breathy/throaty? i feel like it suits the low-key vibe of the music well

^ agreed. if he sounded like Benjamin Booker or something, i'd understand.

just not very expressive or something

or maybe i just don't dig the melodies

If Time Off doesn't do it for you then yeah maybe it's just not your thing.

this is alright but he's definitely moving in a direction away from the things i've generally liked about him

this feels more indie than grateful dead meets fahey

know what you mean, but i'll reserve judgment til i hear the whole thing.
other news: three lobed has put the two OOP gunn-truscinski records together into a nice double LP set
http://threelobed.bandcamp.com/album/ocean-parkway

Now that's more like it.

Tommy's Congo is great. The vocal line reminds me of Dylan's "It's Alright Ma", which may be a good thing

Ah. I see I made the same observation two years ago up thread.....

yeah that's my favorite thing I've heard from him so far, I need to check out the earlier stuff. lotta good recommendations upthread, thanks y'all.

recent gunn-truscinski live tapes are pretty next level:
https://logamp.com/1463/music/tracks/20747
http://www.nyctaper.com/2018/07/gunn-truscinski-duo-july-19-2018-elsewhere/

Would love a whole album that sounds like that song.

the new album "the unseen in between" sounds quite nice. it has a relaxed sunny vibe. besides his tuneful guitar play i quite like his singing too.

this one washed over me without leaving a mark. 'way out weather' is his peak IMO

He’s starting to give me Sam Prekop vibes - laid back and very pleasant and I enjoy it all, but starts to feel indistinguishable after a few albums.

I like the new one but it's not his best. He's very tame on record. A bit wilder live, but only a bit..

📷: @SteveGunnMusic pic.twitter.com/KcuJRgp18s

— Bodega Cats (@Bodegacats_) October 15, 2019

I haven't listened to his "new" album since my last post ^^ in February. That's how dull it is.

Listen to it again. Its very good

I wish he could find a really awesome band to be the lead guitarist for

a hired gunn, as it were

I wish he could find a really awesome band to be the lead guitarist for

― Blues Guitar Solo Heatmap (Free Download) (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Tuesday, October 15, 2019 10:40 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

otm but I feel this way about most of these guitar journeyman types

He would definitely be fun to see let loose in a band. Gunn / Truscinski duo not really a "band" of course, but a very cool forum for straight up Gunn as guitarist action. Desert Heat was cool with Cian Nugent too, hopefully he keeps riding both sides of that equation and does keep putting out more guitar-centric stuff in between the indie-leaning trajectory of the song based stuff. I agree that for me "Way Out Weather" was my favorite batch of songs and approaches to the songs. Still listen to that record all the time. The newer ones just didn't stick as much in regards to repeat plays.

This is probably my most-played Steve Gunn thing these days, just hits a lot of my sweet spots (and I think is a little under the radar for a lot of folks): https://blacktwigpickers.bandcamp.com/album/seasonal-hire

twig pickers are so great

They are! That last track on "Seasonal Hire" is basically like a slightly more straightforward acoustic Pelt w/ additional instrumentation and Steve playing instead of Jack. I love it.

Maybe I didn't give it a proper chance but "Acoustic Unseen" is working a lot better for me than the original album

The new Gunn-Truscinski record is phenomenal.

really liked it, love the very stretched-out pieces and that it gets pretty noisy at times. wasn't steve in magik markers or am i making that up?

I didn't know he was, but it sounds like he might have been with them, at least temporarily in 2006. I found a reference in a Tiny Mix Tapes round-up of the band's 2006:

Of course, this means The Magik Markers just improved upon its old heady tricks. I don't know if she kisses her mother with them sailor lips, but Elisa sure spits some inspired post-Beat, stream-of-consciousness poetry when the moon is up and the bar lights are dimmed. Shards of feedback, drone, and fractured chords sprout from Elisa's doctored guitar. Breaking the third wall, Elisa often uses the audience to her advantage, letting them surround her and strum her guitar to heighten the sense of bedlam. Nolan keeps the band grounded, doing the rhythm-devil thing on his pimped kit. At times, Nolan threw dynamite into the fire with tape loops and pre-recorded hiss. Newly added axe-slinger Steve Gunn also threw down some meaty, dissonant guitar riffage for the Markers' summer tour.

ha, i don't think i knew that. he's not on any MM records is he?

New G-T Duo is so good. If you ordered the physical LP you'll get to read a short thing I wrote on the obi-strip. wow!

I saw that! Pretty cool. Will always take your word if you say it's good. Though if you said it sucked I'd be REALLY curious to check out that obi.

Sadly I only got the CD version, so no obi for me. Is your write up posted anywhere else?

Love this new album. Do the earlier ones sound this way too? I swear I gave one a try a while back and wasn't super into it. But now I can't remember.

xp don't think the essay is posted anywhere at the moment? don't worry, you're not missing too much ...

and yeah, this isn't a huge departure for them — a few tracks here are a little creamier than previous things, but nothing too radically different.

Gunn was on two different Magic Markers releases from 2007 according to discogs- which I’m now keen on hearing.

https://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/steve-gunn-other-you

Might try this one.

Despite my ambivalence toward his last solo effort.

I like it. It’s not a major departure but I do like it more than the last album.

i am always rooting for gunn but man this is some soft ass shit

Haha, that sums up my thoughts on the last one. I'll give this a listen.

Yeah, I really like most of his work but the 2019 solo album left me cold and the reviews for this new one so far don't convince me it will be much different.

I liked his last solo album. Excited to hear this one

Spoke too soon, this new one is lovely. I really like it.

Ok. That's encouraging. I've not got round to it yet.

It's really hard to put my finger on what makes this so much more inviting than Unseen since much of it is still largely in the same vein, but it really is. I was won over fairly early on, but the instrumental track with Mary Lattimore is so beautiful that it took the record to a whole new level.

The guy is probably really beat up about Chapman. I feel bad for him.

As far as the albums go I really miss the loose jammy-ness of the first couple of records in his more recent stuff, but I haven't heard this one yet.

Yeah that instrumental track toward the end of the album was a surprising highlight.

is it just me or does the vocal on "Reflection" sound autotuned to shit?

Got the new one. I'm on first listen and I already like it. It's just more atmospheric (?) than the last one. Dunno. But a good thing.

I’d like to sink comfortably into the smooth acoustic groove web this guy weaves but something is just so grating. A song and a half is the most I can stand

I ate an edible and this album rules

<3

"tommy's congo" = song of the decade

― reggie (qualmsley), Thursday, August 9, 2018 4:01 PM (three years ago) bookmarkflaglink

https://stevegunn.bandcamp.com/album/live-in-london

this must've been some show