Bon Iver Album Review

Wow. This album lived up to all the hype it was given and ran with it.

Bon Iver can no longer be synonymous with Justin Vernon. Starting with "Perth" and ending with "Beth/Rest" the band incorporates many new sounds like a saxophone, snare drum, and a horn section. These new instruments allow the album to have more emotional dimensions and play a crucial role in the feelings Bon Iver is trying to evoke. Justin Vernon has also lost his job as the only singer in "Himmon, TX". Another band member each sings baritone while Vernon sings falsetto in the background. The baritone is a soothing and clear voice that becomes opaque with the falsetto. The two voices intertwine beautifully.

Each song title in Bon Iver is named after a place (fictional or nonfictional) and it sounds like Bon Iver is traveling from place to place feeling a different emotion everywhere he goes. They start with a marching beat and electronic riffs showing us that we are not about to hear For Emma 2.0. Then of course, in Vernon fashion he sings about emotional past girlfriends in "Towers" and "Wash." saying lines like "what a mischief you would bring young darling! When the onus is not all your own" and "no, can’t grow up in that iron ground. Claire, all too sore for sound." He takes us back to his childhood in Michicant saying, "I was unafraid, I was a boy, I was a tender age."And then he finishes the album with Beth/Rest, a love bout I can only assume is about breaking up. His lyrics couldn't be harder to understand, but they don't really matter.

The theme of translucence and unknown are seen in different lights throughout the album. Vernon makes his voice intentionally incomprehensible to use is as another instrument and to make the music sound as if we are seeing something through a dust filled hallway. The real instruments themselves make long notes and repetition to add to that opacity. Vernon represents not being alright with drunkenness and being high saying lines like, "smoke on Sundays when youʼre drunk and dressed out the hollows where the swallow nests."

This album is absolutely wonderful. Bon Iver knows how make music that evokes so much emotion and its great to see them expanding from For Emma. Below I have links to the lyrics because there is no way you can actually understand him and if you haven't had your Bon Iver fix, there are two tracks also out that are on Calgary 12" not the album.

Lyrics
Calgary 12"