Steve Gunn & David Moore

If you’re already acquainted with Steve Gunn & David Moore’s collaboration from 2023, then it’s likely already an oasis, turned to again and again through chaotic times. Gunn, often known as much for his collaborations as his deep and rich solo work, has found himself opposite artists both caustic and calm. He’s paired with Kim Gordon, Bill Nace, Ryley Walker, John Truscinski, Mike Cooper, Mike Gangloff, and more. With David Moore (Bing & Ruth) he’s found a meditative foil, crafting rivulets of calm, threaded with exploratory impulses. RVNG Intl has just begun a series of live LPs, cracking in with an explosive set from Horse Lords, and Steve and David follow in the series, offering up a set recorded live at the renowned Cafe Too in London.

What could have easily been a set of the duo running through the works on Let The Moon Be A Planet verbatim becomes something much more in the hands of two improvisers such as Gunn and Moore. They use the album as a sketch of the set, following the themes of many of the pieces but always winding up somewhere unknown. The pair share a symbiosis, exploring the joy and jubilance of playing in the garden they’d grown on the record. The crowd hushed, reverent, hangs on the hypnotic appeal of the pieces here. They brush through patches of dissonance, a divergence from the studio works, but it never breaks the spell. The album becomes an indispensable companion piece to Moon, but also an exemplary piece in its own right. Improvisation is often associated with blustery solos, frenetic energy, noise and tension, but in the hands of two such accomplished players, the quiet corners of the catalog cut just as deep.

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