Bon Iver’s Speyside: Unplug and go Back to the Woods

Even though Justin Vernon has featured on a number of tracks, including multiple Taylor Swift tracks, we have not had a Bon Iver record in roughly 5 or 6 years. Well, the band is back and they have left the synth and electro mixers at home and went back to that indie cabin in the woods. The raw power and emotion in this delicate track is some of their best work…but we will get there in due time.

First of all, we are back in the days of For Emma Forever Ago and Bon Iver, Bon Iver where the arrangements were largely made up of tangible instruments, as opposed to electro beeps and post-production. Musically, Speyside is a good mix of the two records. It has the inpecable acoustic guitar of For Emma Forever Ago, but it is mixed more like Bon Iver, Bon Iver where Vernon’s vocal is up in the mix and the entire track has more depth and warmth than the band’s earlier work. Leaving the electronic flourishes at home gives the track the heart and soul that was missing on their previous two records. You can really feel the music in this track. Acoustic guitar, strings and the vocal all work magnificently together and give the track emotional depth. In stripping the song back, the band is back to the core of what made them such an indie favourite in the first place.

Justin Vernon has mastered his vocal and uses it with surgical percision on this track. He is like Spielberg sitting back and constructing perfect scenes with as much emotional impact as possible. In the past, Vernon would rely too much on his falcetto, which hid his amazing vocal range. As time has gone on he has used his lower range in tracks with great effect. On Speyside he goes all over the scale with soulful depth and gospel-esque emotional resonance. You don’t feel like he is singing…it’s more like he cut his heart out and is wringing it over a live mic.

Lyrically, this is a song about rebuilding yourself from the ashes of the past. Vernon sings of a man looking back at his mistakes, violence and regret in the cold light of day. In the end he is reduced to nothing more than shattered pieces on the floor. The end of the track “But maybe you can still make a man from me…With what’s left of me / As you live and breathe / I really know now what had hold on me” is beautiful and gut wrenching. I interpret it as a man who has lost everything to addiction and knowing that it had a hold on him is now willing to reach out for help to be put back together. It is pretty open to what you think, but that stuck out to me.

Bon Iver’s Speyside is a song about the human condition and how we can be broken down to our rock bottom, but still have hope that the love of others can rebuild us. This is a beautiful song sung so soulfully and delicately that you will cry.

Listen to Speyside