Bon Iver: Town Hall, New York

For any reader willing to appreciate the well-written-yet-decidedly-hyperemotional train wreck that was the TFR review of Bon Iver's first album back in March, I am now offering you a chance to journey through the Bon Iver concert which ended a few hours ago.

If I am going to sum up the sound of Bon Iver in a few sentences, I'll invoke the image of a man (Justin Vernon) recording a heartbreaking album in the winter seclusion of a Wisconsin cabin. The result is a 'headphones' record, something you listen to quietly and by yourself. There are a lot of whispers and lilts and delicately painful themes happening in this music. The idea of putting this extremely unassuming sound into a concert format is daring on it own.

I will do the effect no justice if I pinpoint highlights of the show. The whole thing spread to fit the spaces in spite of its endless potential failings. A crowd cut through the rain and existential detritus of Town Hall's Times Square fencing and for one rare lapse of time, a group of people (hipsters no less) sat through a show without jabbing at small ironies or talking for its own sake. It seemed almost as if the humility of the performer was contagious.

Vernon was backed by a small band that remained seated for the duration of the show, leaving only to allow Vernon a solo jaunt. The band added drums, guitars, and the harmonies to replicate the album's choral dimension. They were solemn and performed their duties with tacit severity. Distortion gave the live versions kinetic life.

The crowd did not sing along, save for once when asked, the standards of shouts and noises were shut out. In the simplest terms, the atmosphere was that of a classical recital, but younger and more anxious, more funereal.

The doors of the Town Hall would creak as people came in and out, which they did quietly and politely, almost tiptoed, and the creaks did not disturb the softness of the music because the songs had in their themes many effusive points where a listener could imagine a door swinging open in a cold breeze or hinges curling as they closed.

At one point, as Vernon was apologizing (in unforced, uncontrived self-deprecation) explaining that he was not a fan of performing encores (the joke of course being that he lacks the material), one fan interrupted him. It was sudden and jarring.

As the initial embarrassment that everyone feels for that guy in the crowd wore away, the entire audience realized that this was not a heckler shouting abuse or requests, but someone who actually wished to seriously address the band and all 1,500 people there in attendance.

He said that New York had been having a really terrible couple of weeks with the economy and all the uncertainty. Some of the crowd had begun to laugh in solidarity. He added that he really didn't care if there was an encore or not because he was just happy to be in a place with other people listening to good music. When he finished literally everyone clapped. It was how we felt.

Vernon replied, Wow. I didn't hear what he said there at the end, but it all sounded heartfelt. The crowd cheered again and then Vernon thanked the fan and said that it had made his day. It was something. It had made ours too.

Beyond difficult times, this was a show that (a priori) had a lot of obstacles to overcome. How does a singer/songwriter with a ten song album and a four song EP attempt to fill an entire concert set? How does a performer whose trademark reliance on stripped down guitar, vocal layering, and falsetto steam translate his sound enough for a 1,500 capacity venue? How does an act with no singles keep a crowd in his good graces?

The answer according to Bon Iver is talent and gravitas. After the last few songs, the crowd left the quiet of the hall and returned into the latticework and din of Times Square.