Dust off the denim – Steve Earle's debut album is getting the 40th birthday treatment at Memo Music Hall.
Outlaw Entertainment is celebrating 40 Years of Guitar Town with a tribute show honouring Steve Earle’s landmark 1986 debut.
The record shook up Nashville when it landed four decades ago, climbing to the top of the Billboard country chart, earning Grammy nominations and taking out the Rolling Stone Critics Poll. It was the kind of debut that changes a genre’s trajectory, and it turned Earle into one of American roots music’s most enduring figures.
40 Years of Guitar Town
- Memo Music Hall, St Kilda
- 6 March
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Now, Shane Nicholson and Duncan Phillips are teaming up with an all-star band featuring Brad Christmas, James Gilligan, Craig Kelly and Matt Gibson to perform the album in full, front to back, exactly as it was originally sequenced. No rearranging, no shortcuts – just Guitar Town the way it sounded when it first hit the shelves.
After the complete album run-through, the evening shifts gears with a lineup of special guests taking the stage. Freya Josephine Hollick, Lachlan Bryan, Rebecca Barnard and Kim Volkman will each perform selections from Earle’s wider catalogue, spanning deep cuts, celebrated duets and long-time fan favourites that have kept his music in heavy rotation for four decades. The organisers have also hinted at a few surprise additions to close the night out.
Guitar Town’s title track peaked at number seven on the Billboard Hot Country chart when it dropped in 1986, and the album announced Earle as a songwriter with serious grit and ambition. From the opening riff through to the closing track Down the Road, it mapped out a sound that sat somewhere between outlaw country and heartland rock, a combination that felt fresh then and still resonates now. The record earned Earle three Grammy nominations and set the stage for a career that has produced more than 20 studio albums and three Grammy wins.
This tribute promises to bottle all of that raw energy in a single evening at one of Melbourne’s best live rooms. Tickets are on sale now through the Memo Music Hall website.
For more information, head here.
