Music

Haley Bonar

Minnesota alt-country songstress to visit Menomonie

Tyler Griggs |

 
Haley Bonar, clearly pleased with the wallpaper.

She might be Minnesota’s brightest indie folk starlet. Haley Bonar, born around Winnipeg, Canada, raised in the Black Hills of South Dakota, and residing in the Twin Cities, boasts indie sensibilities and flourishes in big, bright folk and alt-country songs that burst with vocal harmonies whose hushed, knowing lyrical poetry meets sensual moans and glorious choruses. Her first album, the minimal and autumnal ...The Size of Planets was released on the label Chairkicker’s Union, courtesy of Duluth slowcore/indie rock band Low frontman Alan Sparhawk, who also provided Haley an opening slot for a then-upcoming Low tour. Her following album, Lure the Fox, fanned her spark into a fire; it was listed among the best albums of 2006 by the Star Tribune, City Pages, and The Onion, and dubbed “Best American Roots Recording” and “Best American Roots Artist” by the Minnesota Music Academy. She has since released her 2008 album Big Star to critical acclaim, toured with Andrew Bird, and contributed vocals to Bird’s 2007 album Armchair Apocrypha. If you can’t make it to the show, know that Haley’s tour schedule reveals she intends to return to the Chippewa Valley for two shows at UW-Eau Claire in The Cabin on May 14 and 15.

Haley Bonar + We Are the Willows • March 11 • Raw Deal, 603 S Broadway St., Menomonie • 8pm • FREE • 232-2432 • bdp.uwstout.edu