Steve Gunn at Acme Records in Milwaukee on December 30, 2025

My first recordings of Steve Gunn for this blog were in April 2018 at Acme Records, both solo and in his duo with percussionist John Truscinski, so it seemed appropriate when I heard that Steve would be returning to this amazing performance space just before New Years' Eve for a solo show.

A lot has happened with Gunn since this first recordings; he signed and eventually moved on from Matador Records, and then released albums on Three Lobed and No Quarter. This past week he released an EP as well.

Gunn's performance was peppered with more distortion than I had expected and some noisy yet subtle electronics as well. 

It seems that before the show, he noticed a patron purchase a Velvet Underground box set and slipped in the lovely cover song, "I'll Be Your Mirror" into his set.

I was very fortunate to be sitting next to local photographer Ryan Sarnowski at this show, and his very much appreciated images are as follows:

Purchase his latest release here.

Recording information:

STEVE GUNN

2025-12-30

Milwaukee, WI

Acme Records

Steve Gunn: guitar and vocals

Setlist

01 Jam (1:50)

02 On the Way (8:29)

03 Morning on K Road (6:16)

04 Way Out Weather (7:14)

05 I’ll Be Your Mirror [Lou Reed] (3:56)

06 Hadrian’s Wall (4:27)

07 Another Fade (10:33)

08 Old Strange (8:00)

09 Nearly There (8:10)

10 Morning Is Mended (9:03)

Total time: 67:58

Recorded with permission by Richard Hayes for this blog

Source: SBD feed

Recorder: Sound Devices MixPre6ii at 32/96

Software: Audacity, Fission, xAct

downloads:

16bit, 44.1 kHz FLAC files (406 MB)

these lossless files can be burned to CDR, if you are into that sort of thing

320 kbps mp3 files (178 MB)

highest quality lossy mp3 files possible

Gunn-Truscinski Duo at Acme Records and Music Emporium in Milwaukee on April 20, 2018

My last post featured a great set by Steve Gunn performing solo during Record Store Day, and this is the amazingly intense instrumental set he and John Truscinski performed the night before. As you can see from the photos below, the lighting (featuring purple-tinted lightbulbs above the stage at Acme) was a bit on the low side during the performance, but the music is really on fire.

photos by Andrew Lyon

This performance was recorded with explicit artist permission by Richard Hayes using a pair of Beyerdynamic MC 930 microphones (which have a cardioid pickup pattern) and fed into a Tascam DR-70D recorder at 24/96 resolution. Audacity was used to provide very gentle EQ and minimal compression. As I often do with instrumental music, I decided to not break up the pieces into individual files and instead allow the set to stand on its own, which it does with ease.

Please support these fine artists and decent people by going to their shows, buying multiple copies of their merchandise (your friends need the music), and talking to them like they are real human beings after shows. If they don't mind and have the time, of course.

http://www.steve-gunn.com

http://www.matadorrecords.com/steve_gunn

https://bandcamp.com/tag/steve-gunn

http://www.paradiseofbachelors.com/steve-gunn/

https://threelobed.bandcamp.com/album/ocean-parkway

http://www.nyctaper.com/?s=Truscinski

https://www.facebook.com/AcmeRecordsMusicEmporium/

A guide to download formats:

WAV = files which are able to be burned as a CD without any conversion steps. This is the largest size of file on offer here.

ALAC = stands for Apple Lossless Audio Codec, which is a method of making a lossless copy of an audio file with about 60% of the space required with a WAV file. You can natively play these files on any Apple device and enjoy the same resolution and sound quality as a WAV file (it just takes up half as much space on your hard drive or device). 

mp3 - this is a lossy compression codec which utilizes psycho-acoustic "tricks" to drop certain audio information which is not noticeable under normal hearing situations. I am not a huge fan of mp3 but still find it useful because a high quality mp3 file will take up about 25% of the room on your storage device compared to a WAV file and about half as much as a ALAC file.

16 bit, 44.1 kHz WAV file (596 MB)

16 bit, 44.1 kHz ALAC file (321 MB)

320 kbps mp3 file (135 MB)

Steve Gunn at Acme Records and Music Emporium in Milwaukee on April 21, 2018 (Record Store Day)

As the chaos and unbridled consumption of yet another Record Store Day descended upon the land, there was an oasis of sonic beauty taking place on the small stage at Acme Records, located in the Bay View neighborhood of Milwaukee. 

A packed room of shoppers -- most too intrigued by the sounds from the stage to continue casually flipping through the bins, slowly began to make their way across the room to check out the guitar playing and songwriting of Steve Gunn. There wasn't much room to move closer, but those who could did and they were rewarded with a relaxed set from a master of the fretboard.

If you haven't had a chance to hear much live Steve Gunn, definitely check out the blog nyctaper.com -- there are plenty of excellent shows there.

Setlist:

1  Night Wander

2  Water Wheel

3  Way Out Weather

4  Park Bench Smile

5  Ancient Jules

6  Mr Franklin

http://www.steve-gunn.com

http://www.matadorrecords.com/steve_gunn

https://bandcamp.com/tag/steve-gunn

http://www.paradiseofbachelors.com/steve-gunn/

Please support this fine artist and decent person by going to his shows, buying multiple copies of his merchandise (your friends need the music), and talking to him like he is a real human being after shows. If you can.

Video of this set was recorded by Richard Hayes with an iPhone 8plus using a Shure MV88 microphone (that is inserted into the lightning port and overrides the built-in microphone) and Motiv Video software at 1080 resolution and 16bit, 44.1kHz WAV audio. 

Audio was captured from the mixer using an aging but still trusty Edirol R-09HR at 24 bit, 96kHz resolution. It was edited in Audacity with minimal EQ and elimination of a few silences as Mr Gunn tuned his guitar between songs. Thanks to Michael Slaboch for his excellent live sound mix in a difficult situation!

I down-converted the WAV to 'Redbook CD' specifications in Audacity and also used xAct to create ALAC (lossless) and mp3 (lossy) versions.

A guide to download formats:
WAV = files which are able to be burned as a CD without any conversion steps. This is the largest size of file on offer here.
ALAC = stands for Apple Lossless Audio Codec, which is a method of making a lossless copy of an audio file with about 60% of the space required with a WAV file. You can natively play these files on any Apple device and enjoy the same resolution and sound quality as a WAV file (it just takes up half as much space on your hard drive or device).
mp3 - this is a lossy compression codec which utilizes psycho-acoustic "tricks" to drop certain audio information which is not noticeable under normal hearing situations. I am not a huge fan of mp3 but still find it useful because a high quality mp3 file will take up about 25% of the room on your storage device compared to a WAV file and about half as much as a ALAC file.

Downloads:

16 bit, 44.1 kHz WAV file (414 MB)

16 bit, 44.1 kHz ALAC file (177 MB)

320kbps mp3 file (94 MB)