Bon Iver

Justin Vernon's project, begun alone in a Wisconsin hunting cabin in the winter of 2006 and grown into a Grammy-winning band with its own studio, festival and pop collaborators.

Origin
Eau Claire, Wisconsin, United States
Years active
2006-present
Genres
indie folk, indie pop, indie rock, experimental pop, folktronica
Labels
Jagjaguwar, 4AD

Eau Claire and Raleigh

Justin Vernon was born in Eau Claire, Wisconsin, on 30 April 1981. He formed the band Mount Vernon in 1997, which made two albums, and studied religious studies at the university in his home town. In 2001 he founded DeYarmond Edison with Phil Cook, Christopher Porterfield and Joe Westerlund, and the band moved to Raleigh, North Carolina. Alongside it he released solo records under his own name, the last of them Hazeltons in 2006.

That year it all came apart at once. DeYarmond Edison split, a relationship ended, and Vernon caught mononucleosis, which he told NPR kept him in bed for three months. He left Raleigh for his father's hunting cabin in Dunn County, Wisconsin, and recorded there alone through the winter on basic equipment. He wrote melodies first and words afterwards, layered his falsetto into a choir, and used Auto-Tune. A laptop crash had already wiped out his older unfinished songs, and he emerged in February with nine new ones. The name comes from the French bon hiver, good winter, a greeting he saw on Northern Exposure while laid up in bed. Vernon later deflated the legend: to The Line of Best Fit, the stay was just a couple of months.

For Emma and Blood Bank

He self-released For Emma, Forever Ago on MySpace on 1 June 2007, then pressed 500 CDs for a release party in Eau Claire that July. Jagjaguwar signed the band on 29 October 2007 and reissued the album on 19 February 2008, with 4AD following in Europe in May. Skinny Love was the first single. The Observer Music Monthly named it the album of the year, and it has since gone platinum in the US. On the road Vernon built a band around him, opening for Elvis Perkins in late 2007 and touring through 2008 and 2009 with Sean Carey on drums, reaching Bonnaroo and Lollapalooza.

The Blood Bank EP followed on 20 January 2009. Its title song, Blood Bank, came from the cabin sessions but had not fitted the album's story. The EP reached 16 on the Billboard 200 and topped the UK independent chart, and its closer, Woods, was sampled by Kanye West on Lost in the World.

April Base

In 2008 Vernon and his brother Nate bought a former veterinary clinic in Fall Creek, near Eau Claire, and built a studio, April Base, mostly over its disused swimming pool. Between records he sang with Volcano Choir and Gayngs, took the part of Orpheus on Anaïs Mitchell's Hadestown, and sang on Kanye West's My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy.

Bon Iver, Bon Iver was made at April Base between late 2008 and 2010 with a wider circle of players, among them Colin Stetson, Rob Moose and Greg Leisz. Vernon said each song was tied to a place. Released in June 2011, it reached two on the Billboard 200 and was Pitchfork's album of the year. At the Grammys in February 2012 Bon Iver won Best New Artist and Best Alternative Music Album, and Holocene was nominated for Record and Song of the Year. A nine-piece touring band with two drummers and horns ended its run in Dublin, and in November 2012 the band announced a break, which the label said was not a split.

Return

Bon Iver came back on 18 July 2015 at the first Eaux Claires festival in Eau Claire, which Vernon co-founded with Aaron Dessner, his partner in Big Red Machine. 22, A Million (2016), produced at April Base with Chris Messina, reached two in both the US and the UK, and i,i (2019) was nominated for Album of the Year. In 2020 Exile, with Taylor Swift, became the band's first US top-ten single, and records with Zach Bryan and Travis Scott followed in 2023.

After regular touring stopped in August 2023, Vernon returned with the SABLE, EP in October 2024 and SABLE, fABLE in April 2025, both produced with Jim-E Stack. In 2026 the band opened VOLUMES, an archival series, with recordings of the six-piece band on tour from 2019 to 2023. Bon Iver have won two Grammys from nine nominations.

Members

Records

Songs

Volcano Choir, Big Red Machine, DeYarmond Edison, Megafaun

Where to go next

Official

Reference

  • Bon Iver A full history, with members and awards.

Discography and data

Writing and criticism

Interviews

Live performance archives

Film and video

Sources

  1. Bon Iver, Wikipedia
  2. Justin Vernon, Wikipedia
  3. For Emma, Forever Ago, Wikipedia
  4. Bon Iver on Blood Bank (and an unlikely hit), NPR (2009-01-03)
  5. Bon Iver: The Craftsman, SPIN (2011-06-29)
  6. The TLOBF interview: Bon Iver, The Line of Best Fit (2008-06-03)