Spotlight: GUNNAR Releases Debut Album ‘Best Mistake’ & Discusses the Inspiration That is Live Performance
THE STAGE — Gunnar Gehl’s favorite place. A surefire dopamine rush, and where the 21-year-old becomes GUNNAR. But for the first time ever, the stage will be the venue for him to share the music from his debut album, Best Mistake. Out today, the album is made up of an eclectic mix of genres — tastes can be heard of ’90s alt-rock, classic rock, and classic country music. Every song on Best Mistake is a clear hit; heavy on guitar and drums, the songs are catchy, vibey, and hold the most exhilarating chorus and bass drops. An album full of hits is rare, but Gehl has managed the practically impossible in creating an album that warrants the statement: it’s an album you can put on shuffle.
Gehl began working on the debut in 2021 and finished it in February of 2022, at the same time he locked in legendary rock producer Brendan O’Brien, who has worked with the likes of AC/DC, Pearl Jam, and Bob Dylan. But the story of Gehl’s first album begins far before that, when he was just six years old.
“I don't actually have a very musical family at all, which is pretty funny,” he shared. “I think the way the story goes in my family is that my mom knows one song on piano, and it's ‘Chopsticks.’ She was teaching me when I was six years old and she thought that I learned it quicker than I should have. So she and my dad decided to get me a guitar for my seventh birthday and I just fell in love with it.”
Gehl’s love for music caught the attention of renowned pop mogul Scooter Braun, who began managing the artist at the age of 16. Gehl moved from Orange County, California to LA at 17 and hasn’t looked back since. Releasing his first EP in 2022, old shit, Gehl received millions of listens per song and garnered over 140K monthly listeners on Spotify.
But Gehl always intended to put out more, with the ultimate intention of creating an album he feels represents him and his growth as an artist and individual. Gehl shared that if you would have told 16-year-old Gunnar that he was releasing an album at 21, he would have been surprised and beyond excited — a humbling feeling.
“I'm really excited that my real first collection of music, that I get to call my first album, is where it is and has taken the time that it has to finally land here,” he said. “I'm just excited. I'm really happy that this direction of music and this version of myself is what is being put forward as my first album.”
That first album being something Gehl describes as music “made for a live show.” “I'd say at its bones the songwriting is kind of — I would hope — timeless classic rock, and that the production on top makes it fresh and modern,” he said. “And I would like to say that it's a fresh take on rock music today.:
The live show is also what genuinely inspires Gehl’s songwriting. “I just want the music to transport people to a show,” he explained. “The songs that I write and the reason that I write them are for how they will come out live. And that's a huge inspiration.”
For Gehl, everything is focused around live performance — he realized the exhilaration he got from performing was more inspiring than any books, TV, or poetry were for him.
And it’s easy to see how GUNNAR’s music moves a crowd. Best Mistake is full of alt-rock hits, with his January single release, “Fuck A Broken Heart,” being his current favorite song off the album. A head-banging track that feels great to belt, it’s perfect for an audience. But Gehl also has a special place in his heart for the album’s focus track, “Bad Idea,” which inspired the title of the debut.
“Basically, the end of the chorus is, ‘I swear to God, that you're the best mistake I ever made,’” he said. “So Best Mistake comes from that, and it kind of parallels and ties entirely into myself over the last two years.”
“Bad Idea” follows the path Gehl was on then, up to the path the artist is on now, and the growth that has happened over the last two years. He learned that everything happens for a reason, and that’s what made what might be categorized as a mistake the best mistake he ever made.
While those might be some of Gehl’s favorite songs, “The Chase” holds one of his favorite memories from when he created the album with O’Brien. At Henson Recording Studio working out of O’Brien’s permanent room there, riffing on some guitars to put in the album, when they needed to grab something from the O’Brien’s office upstairs; Gehl offered to go up.
“I went up there and there was a living room–sized room full of probably the most expensive, nicest, best guitars,” Gehl described, beaming as he recounted the memory. “Like, hundreds of thousands of dollars, probably, worth of guitars. And my jaw hit the floor — I had to grab two of them that I'd never seen before, brought them downstairs, and put them on.” You can now hear those very guitars in the background of “The Chase.”
These are the songs Gehl can’t wait to play live. In fact, his goal for the entire year is to play 100 shows. Starting in February, Gehl is planning a small solo tour of around the south and East Coast, with plans for a supporting role on a headline tour over the spring and summer.
“I would really love to see if my songs could get millions of streams — I would be really happy,” he shared. “And if I could play a hard-ticketed tour by the end of the year, with just a couple 100 people in each city, that would be one hell of a start for me.”
And when it comes to his own personal goals, Gehl is sticking by one mission in particular: “I just want to be in the present and be happy and enjoy all of the little things — the good things, the bad things, the hard things, the easy things.”
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