NPR Music’s First Listen is now streaming the entirety of Steve Gunn‘s magnificent new record Way Out Weather. The stream will be available for one week, up until the October 7 release date, which means that only a week remains for you to place your preorder (directly from PoB only) for a chance to win a vinyl test pressing signed by Steve. Here’s how to order:

Preorder from PoB (LP/CD): https://paradiseofbachelors.com/pob-15
Preorder from iTunes (digital only): http://smarturl.it/SteveGunn_WoW_iTunes
Preorder from Amazon (all formats): http://smarturl.it/SteveGunn_WoW_Amazon
Preorder from Bandcamp (all formats): http://bit.ly/1rMZ6Ts

And some kind words from NPR:

Way Out Weather marks the completion of Gunn’s transformation from a master guitarist into a songwriter who can trust in his own voice and arrangements as much as his spectacular fretwork. He’s thrown open the windows and let the light in, as he embraces pristine, lush production that makes guitars sparkle and drums crack. His voice has never sounded stronger, as he glides effortlessly between an airy croon and an earthy baritone. Although the songs’ intertwining guitars evoke the pastoral, they often operate as a foil for the urgent observations that work their way into Way Out Weather… A testament to Gunn’s adventurous spirit and a reminder that we have no idea where we might find him next.

– Max Savage Levenson, NPR Music

If that’s not sufficient to convince you, read on for more recent praise for Way Out Weather, including an excerpt from a just-published (and perfectly described) 5-star review from the venerable MOJO.

5 stars. Way Out Weather motors slowly but powerfully, like some 70s muscle-car cruising lazy coast-roads, safe in the knowledge of its own killer torque. The album title may abbreviate as a guileless “WOW!”, its bright melodies flickering like autumn sunlight on evening waves, but Gunn’s rolling lyrics deal with darker aspects – the ill omens of climate change, society’s lonesome outcasts, occluded Dylan riddles of impending apocalypse – that infuse the meander and drift of these lazy beguiling songs with a manifest chill, the dark rain clouds up ahead on that perfect summer drive that says sweet times now, bad times coming. You couldn’t wish for a more fitting musical soundtrack to the rest of your 2014.

 – MOJO

The guitarist blends the traditional and the avant-garde, fusing the sounds of John Fahey, The Grateful Dead and Will Oldham into back-porch masterpieces. Gunn’s virtuosic guitar work is still the main attraction, but his backing band of session players gives the song a Rolling Stones-circa-Exile on Main Street vibe. The sick instrumental jam that unfolds after about two and a half minutes is simultaneously earthy and epic.

– Otis Hart, NPR’s All Things Considered, on “Milly’s Garden”

This is masterful, textured and gorgeous. The double-tracked melodic lead guitars billow in like warm sheets of rain. You can sense, as a listener, that every single player has the same overall shape in their mind, and you can feel them all pushing towards it.

– Jayson Greene, Pitchfork, on “Milly’s Garden”

Our heads are blown. How did this NY guitarist become a cosmic-psych visionary? Assured groover “Milly’s Garden” feels like it’s been around forever.

– MOJO Playlist, September 2014, on “Milly’s Garden”

Following 2013’s excellent Time Off, this is a fuller, richer-sounding album. Gunn is an incredible guitarist, [and this is] a sun-dappled, easy highway song, the gleam of guitar pressing against the tarriness of Gunn’s voice.

– Laura Barton, The Guardian, on “Way Out Weather”

8/10. Steve Gunn is managing the transition [into a classic singer-songwriter] with uncanny elegance, fold[ing] his old jamming imperative into beautifully constructed songs. He sings plenty, with engaging huskiness, while leading his band down ever more inventive tangents… Eco-fear played out with a sun-damaged languor.

– John Mulvey, Uncut