Bon Iver’s For Emma, Forever Ago was one of last year’s most lauded releases. And rightly so! It was a heart-rending recording. Holed up in a cabin in wintry Wisconsin, Justin Vernon penned some of the loveliest misery-tinged, affecting folk songs of 2008, perhaps encouraging singer-songwriters to take to the woods and hibernate.
Currently touring Australia, Bon Iver is poised to release Blood Bank on Jagjaguwar on January 20. Featuring Vernon, Mike Noyce and Sean Carey, the four-song EP scratches at the door of For Emma. However, this is a lo-fi effort much more cinematic in nature, and at times very experimental. But it’s not so experimental that it’s unrecognizable – it does not venture too far from Vernon’s previous songwriting.
Acoustic guitar propels “Blood Bank”, accompanied by a solid kick drum posing as a heartbeat. It’s a song about “that secret that we know / that we don’t know how to tell”. Those familiar harmonies are especially powerful as Vernon sings, “I know it well”. Yes, by now we know this sound very well.
“Beach Baby” brought to mind a bright-eyed Neil Young or a stripped-down Elliott Smith. Written in ¾ time, and sung in an indistinct falsetto, it’s imitation country with a touch of blurry slide guitar.
An anxious top-register piano colours “Babys” with a drawn-out introduction – not something you’d want to listen to on repeat. But as the piano fades into the background, the song “grows more and more appealing”.
“Woods” is the most experimental of those included. Sounding much like my grandparents’ vintage organ, it features reedy vocals courtesy of a vocoder (the result sounds much like an oboe) and a chorus of enviable harmonies. It’s a variation on a theme, a meditation on “building a still to slow down the time”. Towards the end, it becomes almost gospel-induced.
A window into the heart of a sensitive poet, it’s just enough to tide fans over until the next major release.
Also check out Bon Iver’s charity t-shirt design, part of the Yellow Bird Project.
MP3:
Bon Iver – Blood Bank
Bon Iver – Beach Baby
Buy at:
Jagjaguwar / Amazon
Video after the jump
Video: Here is “Blood Bank” live in Montreal.
