A well timed mention by my roommate and Paste conspired to bring Bon Iver (‘bone e-vair’ – ‘good winter’ in French) to my attention.  I’m so glad they did.

Justin Vernon recorded For Emma, Forever Ago while living alone in a cabin in the middle of Wisconsin wilderness.  I knew that fact going into the album and have found I can’t listen to it without picturing the lead singer wearing a flannel shirt and carhartt jacket while singing into a lo-fi microphone set up in the middle of a sparse one-room cabin that doesn’t have any furniture except a tattered chair and some books scattered on the floor near a simple cot with a sleeping bag on it.  I don’t know if that’s what it was like … but somehow that one background sentence and the music just end up creating this amazing picture.

I think part of the album’s power comes from knowing that everything sung is said to no one but himself.  On Skinny Love, Justin screams “I told you to be patient \ and I told you it’ll be fine \…\ Who will loooove you? Who will figh-hiiitte?” … which is powerful if the lyrics came from a real conversation … but heart-stopping as you realize the second part is likely coming from the continuation of the conversation in his head.

The album overtook me during Wolves; the simple repeated line “what might have been lost” produces a near-meditative state.  It’s one of those moments where music produces a feeling of religious-like awe.

Although I was excited to see Bon Iver in concert, a little part of me didn’t want to ruin the very personal listening experience I’d had with the music thus far.  Going from me with headphones to me with a couple hundred other people (and poor concert-acoustics) wasn’t appealing.

Bon Iver largely reconciled my personal listening experiences of the album in a live concert setting by playing the entire album in order.  Since, given my many listens, the song ordering on the album feels perfect, indeed it would’ve been extremely jarring to hear the songs in any other order; the setlist-as-album decision was brilliant.

I don’t have too much to say about the actual show; the songs were well done and nicely gripping.  It was a bit odd to have three people in the band since it was recorded alone … but obviously he can’t do everything at the same time live. Wolves and re: Stacks were the stand-outs.  Since he only has one album with 8 real songs on it, the show (like the album) left me wanting more.

I’ve been listening to the album as I wrote this and am up to re: Stacks.  The last verse needs to be mentioned as one of the best album finishes:

                this is not the sound of a new man,
                or a crispy realization.
                it’s sound of the unlocking and lift away
                your love will be
                safe with me

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