Record Review: Bon Iver - For Emma, Forever Ago

Rating: 7.4 / 10.0

Folk is a tough genre. It takes quite a bit of moxie to presume that you can sit down and record a great album with little more than an acoustic guitar and your pipes. It takes an equal (or greater) amount of talent and skill to make good on that presumption. That's why a lot of the best folk acts out there - Okkervil River and Sufjan Stevens spring to mind - are not really folk acts, strictly speaking. Will Sheff and co. inject their folk with a healthy dose of good, old fashioned rock and roll (especially on their last album, 2007's brilliant The Stage Names), and the veritable orchestra that you'll find traveling with Sufjan hardly fits the folk mould. We don't need to dig too deep to find artists that have fallen flat trying to emulate Nick Drake. Look no further than Alexi Murdoch, a talented fingerpicker with a knack for songwriting who produced one of the most boring albums of 2006 simply due to a dogmatic adherence to simplicity.

I don't know if anyone has what it takes to pull of the pure folk thing anymore. I don't want to sound like a prophet of doom, but we don't have a modern day Johnny Cash. We don't have an heir apparent to Nick Drake or to James Taylor or to Cat Stevens. These were giants of folk music in the traditional sense whose work has not, in my experience, ever been imitated convincingly. Rather, they lay the foundation for an evolution of folk music that has been successful, one that incorporated it into the indie mindset that many songwriters espouse. Attempts at "pure" folk in the vein of the late greats, however, are rarely particularly successful.

So on his debut, For Emma, Forever Ago, Justin Vernon aka Bon Iver is taking a risk. Vernon tries to keep it purely folk. The mix is spare; with little more than acoustic gutiar and bass drum to compliment the vocals. For the most part, this record is a guy with a guitar and a great voice.

But what a voice. I'm inclined to say that few artists - let alone folk artists - have voices with such versatility. On "Flume", he manages to evoke the shrill pain of a Spencer Krug, while on "Skinny Love", he channels the soul of Tunde Adebimpe. And on "Creature Fear", his voice is all Vernon's, soft, soulful, weaving meandering melodies that swirl between deep croons and soaring (but never grating) falsettos.

The versatility of his voice, however, fails to make up for the sameness of the arrangements. In fact, the dynamic character of Vernon’s voice isn’t well suited to the sort of arrangements he presents on this record. There is a disconnect between his distinctive voice and the vanilla arrangements, such that it detracts from the overall quality of the album. The first seven tracks sound more or less like one long track. "For Emma" is a bit more upbeat, with splashes of horns to compliment the vocals and guitar. Sadly, the melody on this track is the weakest one on the whole record. It makes me wonder why Vernon didn't approach every other song that way - the songs with stronger melodies and lusher harmonies could have benefitted from such strokes of instrumental creativity.

I don't think I could say it enough that I cannot get enough of Vernon's voice. But ultimately, this is a record that doesn't know when it's appropriate to pull out the bells and whistles. It is restrained to the point of sounding self-conscious, timid to a fault. Vernon’s next release would do well to be a sight more ostentatious.

-PTC