In observance of Bon Iver’s career catalogue to date, each third can be easily identified through a distinct phase or impression: There was the apocrypha of For Emma, Forever Ago, the prophecy of Bon Iver, Bon Iver, and now the martyrdom that is 22, A Million. While the martyrdom is certainly sensationalistic in some regards, there’s a reason for such nomenclature – following Bon Iver’s 2012 Grammy win for “Best New Artist” and “Best Alternative Album,” Justin Vernon desperately needed (for his own well-being, not for the sake of the masses) to shed the label of “indie god.” In a way, Bon Iver had become exactly what Vernon had feared – a proverbial gateway drug to the world of independent alternative folk rock. So Vernon simply “ended” Bon Iver.

The instantaneous termination of Bon Iver devastated many a self-indulgent millennial hipster, of whom had yearned for an Elliot Smith or Kurt Kobain of their own, and to most, that was Vernon. But being placed on a pedestal of overblown apocrypha and adulation was never a desire of Vernon’s, who sought not to appease the fervent masses that had deified him without his consent. So he disappeared, hiding in plain sight the entire time - five years of runs with the likes of Volcano Choir, The Shouting Matches, (the highly publicized) Kanye West collaborations – but never producing new Bon Iver, outside of a commissioned track for a Zach Braff film (“Heavenly Father”), which Vernon aired his criticism of the process on a handful of occasions.

All the while, self-ascribed Vernon-nites pined for more Bon Iver, but Vernon would assert with great confidence Bon Iver was on hiatus, stating that intense writer’s block and creative stunting had impeded the process of envisioning Bon Iver’s next iteration. Then Eaux Claires came along, rekindling Vernon’s Bon Iver creative kick, presenting two new tracks (“666 ʇ” and “29# Strafford APTS”), and the following year, running through 22, A Million in its entirety.

Thus, indie en masse was aroused by the ensuing prospect of a Bon Iver album release, but at what price? The new tracks and eventual single releases – “22 (OVER S∞∞N)” and “10 d E A T h b R E a s T” – were utterly divisive and dissociative amongst fair-weather Bon Iver listeners, sighting the warbled vocoder effects and reverse percussive sounds alongside emoji-laden song titles as uninspired flourishes. But for the initiated and more familiar of Bon Iver faithful, the meaning of the peculiar track titles and hellish sound sequences were apparent – 22, A Million is the martyrous dissociation of Bon Iver as we know, all the while maintaining every tenant of classic “Bon Iver-dom." There are a myriad of reasons why a devout (with blind faith) Bon Iver disciple would assert that every single song serves as an ahead-of-its-time template that the next wave of industrial folk aficionados will undoubtedly imitate in vain.

22, A Million marks Bon Iver’s most impressionistic work to date, operating almost entirely upon an emotional plane. Songs like “715 – CR∑∑KS” delve into a single location that carries such depth and weight for Vernon that it seems as though there’s an attempt to masque the visceral emotion brought about by Vernon through the intricate (and magnificent) musical composition. Other tracks resemble the attempts at obfuscating emotion through synthetic flourishes, warping a distorted Vernon vocal to almost totally dissociate Eau Claire’s prodigal son, as he only provides the most intense and brief glimpses into Vernon’s past five years with little to no context, tracks like “33 “GOD”” being prime examples – “Staying at the Ace Hotel;” corporate branding, I think not.

Less observant listeners have gone as far as opining the newest iteration of Bon Iver is nothing more than bombast and old hat tricks of the indie trade, but one can only hope that such close-minded dismissal of anything other than For Emma or Bon Iver, Bon Iver will become withered and eventually dismissed within its own right upon a simple careful listen to 22, A Million. Where Vernon’s first two projects dealt primarily with the most outright of narratives in service of emotion and verve, 22, A Million focuses on the atmospheric feeling and synthetic grit to best service the project. While the primary focus of 22, A Million will likely never be revealed, as Vernon has become increasingly reclusive (or at least expressed his desire to do so) throughout the promotional cycle for the record, and tracks like “22 (OVER S∞∞N)” hint at a possible end to Bon Iver – “It might be over soon…” – 22, A Million will serve as the finest dissociation of Justin Vernon from Bon Iver, making it the project’s best work to date, and if things truly will be over soon, Bon Iver’s greatest album ever.

Bon Iver Debuts Tempestuous New Single, "33 'GOD,'" off '22, A Million'

August 29, 2016New MusicSean McHughComment

Justin Vernon has released another single to precede Bon Iver’s highly anticipated September 30th release, 22, A Million, out on Jagjaguwar, conspicuously titled “33 ‘GOD.'” Arguably the most tamely titled track on an otherwise baffling slate of album tracks, “33 ‘GOD'” is magnificently nebulous in its genre depiction of this newest iteration of Bon Iver.

Where For Emma Forever Ago presented a solitary Vernon coming to terms with myriad personal crises (and creating never ending apocrypha of “the cabin”) and Bon Iver, Bon Iver offered a more musically magnanimous version of Bon Iver (and continued to challenge perceptions of “Bonny Bear”), “33 ‘GOD'” combines both.

The track almost comes off as a combative confluence of Bon Iver new and old - seemingly more expansive (a la Bon Iver, Bon Iver) in its warping musicality, all the while seeming more and more enclosed within Vernon’s personal narratives (For Emma), but being something wholly foreign to previous Bon Iver efforts as well.

Musically, the song is all over the place, but in the most ethereal of compositions – the track opens with soulful piano and heavily distorted samples of Paolo Nutini’s “Iron Sky,” along with Lonnie Holley’s “All Rendered Truth.” Sampling is new territory for Bon Iver, but not Vernon, as his famous collaborations with Kanye West have undoubtedly exposed the Eau Claire native to the act quite a bit.

When Vernon’s trademark Bon Iver falsetto comes in, its familiar, but with a more Kanye-esque auto tune timbre, which warps into a brooding howl at certain points as the heavily modded percussion rumbles toward spiritually pitched breaks that recall a less tempestuous Bon Iver; a Bon Iver far less realized than the one “33 ‘GOD'” present.

It should be noted that lyrically, the song features what is arguably Vernon’s most tangible allusion to personal experience – the Ace Hotel. But even with such a fact, The Ace Hotel is a chain, featuring 9 different locations, so insight into what personal allusion the reference holds in Vernon’s journey is still entirely shrouded – as Vernon undoubtedly would prefer it to stay.

It seems unlikely that Vernon will release any more tracks from 22, A Million considering there have already been three singles released prior to the album’s release, and “33 ‘GOD'” just so happened to release on the evening of the same day 22, A Million had its first substantial leak.

That being said, 22, A Million appears to be shaping up as a titan of the 2016 release schedule, and a certifiable top-5 album of 2016 contender.

http://smarturl.it/BI_22AM 22, A Million Out September 30 on Jagjaguwar Created/Produced/Directed by Aaron Anderson & Eric Timothy Carlson Artwork by Eric Timothy Carlson Source Video by Kyle Frenette

After Five Years Bon Iver Announces New Album, '22, A Million,' Releases Two New Tracks

August 13, 2016New Music, Music NewsSean McHughComment

Hold onto your high and tight fades you hipster hopefuls, Justin Vernon has returned from the proverbial woods to bestow yet another (seemingly) immaculate album via Bon Iver (or “Bonny Bear,” if you have only a casual predilection), entitled 22, A Million.

This might seem like yet another “surprise” release in a year that has been saturated with irrefutably tiresome “event” music cycle, but in true Vernon fashion, promotion for the new record has been under operation in plain site for months (even years). The first indication is the conception of Vernon’s passion project, Eaux Claires Music and Arts Festival - which Vernon co-founded with The National’s Aaron Dessner. A festival, which was indicated as an annual event in which Vernon would be able to premiere various Bon Iver and non-Bon Iver, related works.

The second indication came more recently, as promotional efforts ramped up with a mysterious YouTube video released on July 22nd featuring the title “#22days” and a tune that we now know as album single “22 (OVER S∞∞N).” Then, in early August, the Bon Iver socials began to tease artwork, and eventually, a “pedestrian” (really just an industry plant) happened upon a street mural featuring similar art to the 22, A Million album cover.

After the under-our-noses vague promotion, we now know the full, ephemerally wonderful scope of Bon Iver and JV’s shenanigans – 22, A Million is due out on September 30th, via long time Bon Iver label, Jagjaguwar. Vernon and co. premiered the entire 10-track record at Eaux Claires, fully realizing the festival’s purpose, and released two singles from the record immediately following the band’s headlining set.

Between the two singles, it's obvious that the Teenage Engineering OP-1 that Vernon had casually mentioned in a handful of interviews to promote Eaux Claire’s inaugural year in 2015 played a far more substantial role in JV and Bon Iver’s creative process for 22, A Million than anyone could have imagined. “22 (OVER S∞∞N)” and “10 d E A T h b R E a s T ⊠ ⊠” both feature every iteration of Bon Iver channeled through OP-1 production styles and effects. Conceivably, Justin Vernon has managed to do the impossible by not only maintaining Bon Iver tenants of musicality, composition, and lyricism, but progressing the entity itself without any repercussions from such growth.

Outside of the two singles, which include the classic lyrical cryptic messaging and phraseology, not much else is known about 22, A Million, and it's likely little else will be revealed until the album’s 9/30 release date. That being said, for the uninitiated that desire to find out more, it should be noted that the number 22 has played an immeasurably substantial role in Vernon’s life, via a press release for the album:

22 stands for Justin Vernon. The number's recurrence in his life has become a meaningful pattern through encounter and recognition. A mile marker, a jersey number, a bill total. The reflection of '2' is his identity bound up in duality: the relationship he has with himself and the relationship he has with the rest of the world. A Million is the rest of that world: the millions of people who we will never know, the infinite and the endless, everything outside one's self that makes you who you are. The other side of Justin's duality is the thing that completes him and what he searches for. 22, A Million is thus part love letter, part final resting place of two decades of searching for self-understanding like a religion. And the inner-resolution of maybe never finding that understanding. When Justin sings, "I'm still standing in the need of prayer" he begs the question of what's worth worshipping, or rather, what is possible to worship. If music is a sacred form of discovering, knowing and being, then Bon Iver's albums are totems to that faith.

Seeing as the album is set to release in early Fall, a 2016 tour announcement seems unlikely, but do not be surprised if Bon Iver hits the road in early 2017, as by that point, 22, A Million will have likely achieved indie-immortality that demands JV and Bon Iver’s presence once more.

Listen to “22 (OVER S∞∞N)” and “10 d E A T h b R E a s T ⊠ ⊠” and see the full tracklist below:

http://smarturl.it/BI_22AM 22, A Million Out September 30 on Jagjaguwar Created/Produced/Directed by Aaron Anderson & Eric Timothy Carlson Artwork by Eric Timothy Carlson Photograph by Cameron Wittig & Crystal Quinn No Justins were harmed in the making of this lyric video

http://smarturl.it/BI_22AM 22, A Million Out September 30 on Jagjaguwar Created/Produced/Directed by Aaron Anderson & Eric Timothy Carlson Artwork by Eric Timothy Carlson

22, A Million

22 (OVER S∞∞N)
10 d E A T h b R E a s T ⊠ ⊠
715 - CRΣΣKS
33 “GOD”
29 #Strafford APTS
666 ʇ
21 M♢♢N WATER
8 (circle)
_45__
00000 Million

The Staves Discuss the Transience of 'Sleeping In A Car' and Loving Eaux Claires

June 28, 2016Music InterviewSean McHughComment

The life of a touring musician is one such existence that has been prophesied and romanticized in every which way, but the one prevailing commonality amongst touring musicians remains the mode in which a transient life can impact one's purview on music and life as a whole. Touring can perturb and intimidate, but for others like English sister trio, The Staves, a life of transience marked by fleeting moments while in constant motion can be irresistible. Having spent the better part of two years on support of their 2015 full-length If I Was and their most recent EP release, Sleeping In A Car, it would be fair to assume that the road has come to mold The Staves' approach to their acoustic folk music immeasurably, along with producing lifelong creative partnerships with the likes of Justin Vernon.

Transverso spoke with the eldest of the three, Emily Staveley-Taylor, to find out more about their view of life on the road and its impact on their career to date.

'Sleeping In A Car' EP Available Now iTunes http://smarturl.it/SleepingInACar.iT Spotify http://hyperurl.co/SIACSpot Subscribe to The Staves: http://goo.gl/Mn5ER9 Directed and Edited by The Staves ------------ Follow The Staves http://thestaves.com http://facebook.com/thestaves http://twitter.com/thestaves http://soundcloud.com/the-staves

TRANSVERSO: You’re pretty close to the end of your tour. How have things been playing out thus far?

Its been so much fun. It's been like really, really great. We’ve just been so amazed by the people that have come to see us, and it's just been a riot – I’d forgotten how much fun it is touring in the States. So fun.

You've been touring in support of If I Was for the better part of a year and a half now, is that correct?

Yes, I guess so. A year and half, I believe.

And it looks like the touring has been pretty extensive – has the reception for the record been what you anticipated, or did you have any expectation at all?

No, I don’t think we had any expectations. I mean, you never know, really. For us, it's always about just kind of playing new music, and we just love it. And we love traveling around, and we’ve just been really lucky that people have been into it. That’s really a great bonus.

How has the transient lifestyle lent itself to an EP like Sleeping In A Car?

I think the more you do it, the more you realize what sort of a strange life choice it is. Yeah, I guess our songs have sort of started to reflect our lives when you are kind of displaced, I suppose; when you’re far away from your friends and your family and your grounding, your home where you’re kind of familiar. So yeah, things kind of become stranger and slightly more surreal, and slightly harder to retain a sense of normality. So I guess that’s what we’ve been exploring in certainly this last EP and probably parts of the last album as well. So it feels kind of quite fitting to play those songs on the road.

So did you spend a lot of time writing Sleeping In A Car on the road as well?

No, we don’t really write on the road; generally there’s never really any time. So we try and write when we have breaks from touring.

How long of a break did you have to write the EP? Was it all in one moment, or was it split up?

The title track was actually demoed almost a year before. It's really kind of a different process for each of the songs – some of the songs have been kicking around for a long time, and sometimes a song comes to fruition in the space of a few days. And this EP was a little bit of all of those things, so yeah. The recording and coming together of all three tracks was really done in a week.

I read that you recorded the EP in both London and Eau Claire – at Urchin Studios and April Base respectively – how does that happen? Does that effect the recording process at all?

Well, we recorded 90% of the EP at April Base Studios and then it was time for us to come home – our flight was booked – but we hadn’t quite finished it yet and Matt [Ingram] has a great studio in London [Urchin], and we were able to book in a couple of days there, so we went in and just finished it. It was stuff like all we needed to do was change the drums on the second verse of this that and the other, add a harmony line to this thing. So it was really kind of the finishing touches, but we had all the basic from April Base; it was kind of just finishing the decorating.

Sleeping In A Car's transient lifestyle “tone” – being an “outlaw,” stolen phone in the night, etc. – almost feels like you’re creating a “runaway” mentality. Is that a fair way to interpret it?

Yeah, I guess so. I think it feels like that sometimes – you’re living outside of any rules of normality that [it] seems like most other people live by. Its kind of disorienting, but also really liberating, and even kind of exciting. Yeah, it's kind of all of those things at the same time, and its kind of a bit dangerous if you don’t try really hard, you can lose your head. It also makes you feel really alive. Its great. Sometimes you do certainly feel like you are kind of an outlaw, just operating on the periphery.

So in a way, does the EP act as a coping mechanism for extended periods of time spent on the road?

I think that music is a coping mechanism for life, really, genuinely. I think it’s a place where you get to explore what you’re thinking and feeling about what’s been going on in your life. It’s a place where you get to try and make sense of it, or try to understand it better. Its almost like a form of therapy – putting it into a piece of art, to study it in a way – to kind of take yourself away from it for a bit, and you can see it more clearly. I think that we’ve been finding that more and more, as we’ve been writing more and more. We really, really felt it with the last album, and I think it continued with the EP with that vibe. Sometimes its only when you finish making the music that you actually realize what has been going on for you, like "Oh yeah, its there. I finally see it.” Its like this mirror that I finally see clearly through – that’s how we feel about it anyway.

Has your time spent on the road had any sort of impact on your approach to performing the songs live as well?

I guess so. I think really – in all honesty – money has a large impact on all of that stuff. If you’re playing some kind of show and they have a big budget then you can do something really kind of outrageous and have extra players with you, and you can try all the stage, and all sorts of lights and everything. It can be a wonderful thing to do. We actually did that recently in London - it was great – we had three brass players, two string players, and there were loads of us, and it was great fun, but when you don’t have much money, you kind of have to do more yourself. At first that’s frustrating, but actually, it's been really, really fun. We’ve been playing instruments that we’ve never played before – Camilla’s playing bass, I’m playing a lot with synths, Jess has got a keyboard – it's just a different set up now for us, and I think its really breathed some new life into a lot of older songs, certainly. We’re just really enjoying feeling more like a band than we ever had done, rather than us just singing together. Its really exciting, its really fun being on the road with this set-up.

Now that things are winding down on the tour do your live sets feel more nebulous or are things becoming more and more familiar?

Well, not really; the tour is coming to an end, but we have festivals in the States right through to the end of August – some of them we’re writing special pieces for, so there’s lots of writing, rehearsing, and traveling around for that. And then we’re kind of staying out in the States until Christmas time – we don’t know where we’re going to living, or what we’re going to be doing - we just kind of decided to hang out on this side of the pond for a while. So we feel kind of ungrounded and unsure of what the future holds. [Laughs]

I would imagine that’s the beauty of the situation that you’re in.

Yeah, it is. And its also one of the great things about being in this situation with my sisters – that there’s always a large piece of home with me wherever I go – so that really helps.

Does that help out in maintaining your proverbial “sanity” while touring so extensively? You all seem to be pretty clever, and I would imagine that humor plays a nice role in easing the strain of touring.

I think that’s true. I think that humor plays a great role in everything, for everyone, and we’d go mad without it.

Most people are pretty familiar with The Staves’ association to Justin Vernon, but I saw that you guys played Sydney Opera House in a sort of “in-the-round” set-up. What was that like?

Oh, it was really exciting. I mean Justin and everyone in that band and crew just have a very, very exciting way of thinking about music and about art and about performance and its really an inspiration to just be around it. And to tailor a show to a building like Sydney Opera house, where it really plays to the room was wonderful to watch that kind of evolve. Its just great fun to be a part of – we love the music – its really interesting for us to sing in that band, because we get to use our voices kind of more as instruments – we’ve kind of been singing the horn parts or the string section – it's kind of a way that we’re not used to. I kind of think that’s informing some of the stuff that we’re writing right now, it gives a lot to think about in terms what we do vocally. It's great. [Laughs] I mean, who gets to go and perform at Sydney Opera House? It's wild.

It seemed like it would be phenomenal. On that same note, I saw you at Eaux Claires last summer, so I wanted to get your take on what it was like for you, to be an artist performing at such a unique festival.

Oh no way! Well I think that one of the amazing things about that festival was that the artists really had a similar experience to the viewers and everyone just got really excited, and felt really lucky to be there. All the artists were watching the other artists, everyone was just hanging out, and everyone was just excited to be a part of it, and everyone really was a part of it. It was successful because the vibe that all the people brought to it. We’re really excited to be playing it [again] this year. We’re actually doing a special piece with yMusic. Do you know them? It’s a sextet of chamber music.

Right! Rob Moose is a part of yMusic, right?

That’s right, yeah. All of those guys! So we’re going to be writing something together just especially for the festival. Its just a joy. The people that were there, the people that went to the festival were there to really enjoy the music. A lot of other festivals have become corporate, or commercial, or become more about getting wasted in a field, and taking Instagram photos, where Eaux Claires was just about the music. It was so refreshing, and so magical, and its kind of why I love the Midwest so much. [Laughs]

Bon Iver Ends Eaux Claires Fest With Two New Songs

July 19, 2015Music NewsGraham von OehsenComment

In spite of Justin Vernon’s insistence that there are no future plans for Bon Iver, the band played two new songs last night during their headline set at Vernon’s own Eaux Claires Music and Arts Festival. Maybe this means they’re at it again. We’ll have to wait and see.

Listen to them below:

'Wish I Was Here' Soundtrack Contains New Bon Iver, The Shins, and More

July 5, 2014Music News, TV/Film NewsWeston PaganoComment

Ten years ago Zach Braff’s last film Garden State did wonders for propelling indie, specifically The Shins, into the mainstream spotlight. It seems Wish I Was Here, his Kickstarter-funded forthcoming directorial sophomore effort, will be similarly musically inspired, with a soundtrack boasting many of the screenwriter and star’s favorite artists, including Paul Simon and The Head And The Heart.

The Shins appear once again with shimmering new tune “So Now What,” with frontman James Mercer taking a break from side-project Broken Bells to write the song specifically for this sountrack. Just as wistful and dreamy as they were a decade ago, the now Portland-based sextet seem eager to reunite with Braff with lines like “I guess we’ll just begin again / I hope you know you’re my best friend” making up the soaring chorus lifted by Mercer’s gentle and softened falsetto.

Another new track commissioned for Wish I Was Here is Bon Iver’s eerie and minimalistic “Heavenly Father.” Justin Vernon’s vocals layer over a looping synth vibration in what, according to NPR, was an incredibly spontaneous recording:

“They were enjoying it and laughing, but at a certain point, they just got quiet. When it was over, Justin started humming. We talked afterwards about the relationship between Zach’s character and his brother [Josh Gad], and Justin and Nate talked a little about their father — all the while Justin kept distractedly humming. Eventually, he sang out the words ‘heavenly father.’ Before I even left their house, Justin was recording the first version of the song in his downstairs studio. His inspiration was that immediate.”

The complete soundtrack is due out July 15 via Columbia with the film hitting theaters three days later. There will be a separate vinyl release on August 5, with Garden State’s soundtrack being reissued the same day. Check out the tracklist below:

Wish I Was Here