Bon Iver’s ‘SPEYSIDE’: Euronews Culture’s verdict

As so many great albums do, Bon Iver’s 2008 debut ‘For Emma, Forever Ago’ began because of heartbreak. 

Recovering from a serious illness and breakup, the band’s frontman Justin Vernon moved to a remote cabin in Wisconsin, US, where he wrote and recorded songs over the course of three months.  

Its tracks like ‘Flume’, ‘Re: Stacks’ and the oft-covered ‘Skinny Love’ became huge hits, introducing a stripped-back, woodsy and whimsical sound that captured a generations’ growing sense of listlessness and soul-scrunching loneliness; a campfire crackle to coming of age moments. 

Since then, Vernon has released three more studio albums, including 2011’s sweepingly melancholic ‘Bon Iver, Bon Iver’, 2016’s experimental, synth-spotted ‘22, A Million’ and 2019’s ‘i,i’, which cemented his place as one of today’s most innovative and beloved musical geniuses. 

In-between, he’s collaborated with some of the world’s biggest artists, like Taylor Swift, The National, Kanye West and, most recently, Charli XCX on her new remix album ‘Brat And It’s Completely Different But Also Still Brat’. 

The new EP ‘SABLE’ arrives at just the right time, as the season changes, bringing with it the chilly breeze of reflection and a past that’s shaking loose any lingering relics. 

Opening with a long discordant bleep, we’re immediately taken to a liminal-like state that’s reminiscent of dial tones or flatlined monitors – a shrill ringing out with no one on the other end. It feels like the sound of a reset, of letting go of what has been.

Vernon’s four new tracks are an achingly beautiful confrontation of change, removing rivets of artifice to reveal an artist at their most vulnerable and restless, moving through states of emotional reconciliation. 

Similar to his first album, Vernon began recording ‘SABLE’ in isolation – this time because of the pandemic in 2020. It was a time swollen with anxiety that enclosed us in a world suddenly strange and scary. It also forced many of us to confront ourselves in ways we could previously drown with distraction.

In ‘THINGS BEHIND THINGS BEHIND THINGS’, Vernon wrestles with such rumination, his trademark repetition of lyrics like “I would like the feeling / I would like the feeling / I would like the feeling gone” yearning for reprieve. This is the sound of someone slow-dancing with their worries, the song never daring to soar, instead gently stirring with the lap, lap, lap of emotions that occasionally sweep the shore to difficult revelations: “I am afraid of changing”. 

The soft, meandering simplicity of Vernon’s lyrics have always been one of his main strengths, able to capture so much with a pained honesty. ‘SPEYSIDE’ spins the antsy anxiety of the previous track into a grappling with guilt. To the somber strums of an acoustic guitar, he sings, “I know now that I can’t make good / But how I wish I could go back and put / Me where you stood”. It’s filled with so much regret and remorse, a longing to make past mistakes right but also an acquiescence to what has been, all cradled on sympathetic strings that let in hope: “Well maybe you can still make a man from me”.

By the final track, ‘AWARDS SEASON’, the sadness seems to have broken, making way for newfound resilience and acceptance. “I can handle / Way more than I can handle / So I keep reaching for the handle / To flood my heart,” Vernon’s vocals cry to a cerebral hum that’s tickled with the gradual layering of piano keys, pining strings and a soaring saxophone (reminiscent of Bon Iver’s brilliant ‘Beth/Rest’). The instruments are free flowing, creeping in and out like the wash of change: “And you know what is great /Nothing stays the same”. 

Every Bon Iver album uses a comma in its title, suggestive of a continuing thought, a mid-sentence that’s still being made sense of. It’s what has made Vernon’s music so special to so many, an encapsulation of the endlessly wandering existentialisms of our inner worlds.

‘SPEYSIDE’ is quite possibly one of Vernon’s most intimate works yet, shedding any pretense in this deeply-affecting rebirth of an artist that has always understood the pull of change, even if he is only now embracing its full potential.

Bon Iver’s ‘SPEYSIDE’ is out now.