BON IVER:
Anywhere from Here

    Reading the unanimous critical praise, I couldn’t figure out what these strangers could hear that I was missing. Critics fawned over the record with words such as “wondrous” and “divine.” Paste compared Justin’s singing to “a sort of wolf pack harmony serenading the wide-eyed Wisconsin moon.” A blogger on musicomh.com marveled, “It’s rare to be so gushing about a debut album – yet after living with this album for a few weeks, you’ll be hard pressed to find any flaws.”

    The way For Emma eventually grew on me, slowly over several months, reminded me of my college roommate’s music preferences. If he bought a CD and was put off on the first listen, he considered that a good sign. If he liked it right away, that meant it was too simple and would quickly fade.

    It’s also interesting how national audiences had the advantage of not comparing For Emma to Justin’s past work. As a teacher, my eighth-grade students are the same. With no style-change adjustments, they pick up on it much more easily. I play music between class periods, and when I put on “Skinny Love” or “Lump Sum,” kids inquire about it more than any other music I’ve ever played in class. They want to know how to spell it, where to get it. “For Emma” and “Re: Stacks” also work as calming agents when the kids come in bouncing off the walls.

    Funny that Vernon’s music can be used to relax middle school students, when in the past, Mount Vernon could pack a dance floor with kids pogo jumping all over the place. Will Justin’s music ever reverse the quieter path he’s been going down continually since the celebratory hootenanny of Mount Vernon?

    “There’s more than one direction,” Justin counters. “There’s more than left and right on that linear path. And that’s what I sort of realized. It’s so much more wide open. I might have some clues about what the next record might sound like, but I’m not going to think too much about it until I actually have time to sit down and bury myself into a new space.”

ROOTS
    Somewhere back around 2001, knowing Justin from the interviews, I asked him if he’d come in and be a guest speaker in my English classes at South. Three years in a row, he gave up a day to play music and talk songwriting with the kids at his alma mater.

    I’ve seen dozens of guest speakers. Some are ignored; others are politely acknowledged. But Justin could captivate the kids like a crackling campfire. Every kid. Every year. Mesmerized.

    Justin talked a lot about getting inspiration from one’s surroundings, such as Camp Manitou, as well as his own middle school and high school experiences. A far cry from the social misfit status with which many songwriters recall their growing up years, Justin was a captain of the football team, basketball player, and singer in an enormously popular band. He was the kind of kid liked by both teachers and students – possessing the same cross-generational appeal of his band’s music. In talking to the kids, he stressed openness to people, places, and experiences, and channeling those into artistic expression.

    The day after his visit, it was always easy to get kids to write; the inspiration was still in the room. It came back every time I played his music during writing time. To this day, I still put on DeYarmond Edison to help me when I need to get into deep concentration for my own writing. In fact, it’s playing in my headphones as I type this sentence.

    Just before school started this year, I received an email from a former student settling indo her new life in college. She told me of her plans to be an engineer and how she was reminiscing about Eau Claire: 

•     One event in particular is standing out, and that was when you brought Justin Vernon to class. He shared his music with us, he played for us, and I believe I fell in love. Okay, not with Justin, but with his voice and the way he performed. From that day on...I listened to DeYarmond Edison continuously. Then Bon Iver. Yes, Bon Iver. I went to his first concert at the House of Rock last summer, sang along with the photocopied lyrics, and thought there couldn’t be anything better.
•     I’m glad to have his music in my life.... For Emma, Forever Ago will be associated with some pivotal and emotional times in my life. There is no way I can look back on some events and not begin to hum the melody to Wolves or Skinny Love. I will never forget the day, five years ago, when he sat in front of us in your classroom and played. He spills out his soul every time.

    Those were some of my all-time favorite teaching days, and one moment stands out the most. At the end of a class period, a student approached Justin and asked for his autograph. Several of this boy’s friends played it cool and gave him smirks and eye-rolls that said he was taking it too far. As Justin good-naturedly signed the spiral notebook, the kid sheepishly defended himself to his friends. “Well,” he said, “you never know....”