Bon Iver’s Justin Vernon has revealed he hopes to go on a tour of Wisconsin in the run-up to the next US election.
Vernon was born in the state, where he also owns a studio and runs his Eaux Claires festival. Wisconsin was an important state in the 2016 election, helping Trump to victory, and is expected to play a key role in the next election too.
The Bon Iver frontman, who has said he supports the policies of Democratic candidates Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, told Pitchfork he wants to tour Wisconsin in October 2020 in a bid to raise money for whoever the Democratic presidential nominee is. “We will have super-high ticket prices, low production [costs], hopefully the candidate can come out and speak,” he said.
He added that he would subsidise his crew for the whole tour so the run of dates could help “get a bunch of money and give it to the people who need it to run this shit better.”
Vernon also discussed Trump’s influence on the latest Bon Iver album, ‘i, i’. The record’s penultimate track is called ‘Sh’diah’, which stands for “shittiest day in American history” and refers to the morning after the day Trump was elected.
“If you could drop an MDMA cloud on the White House, just maybe he would have empathy,” Vernon said of the current US President. “But we don’t want to make the mistake of sending all our energy to this one guy. He’s just a metaphor. He’s a black hole.”
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Elsewhere in the interview, Vernon said he and Kanye West have grown apart due to the rapper’s political views.
‘i, i’ was released last week (August 9). In a five-star review, NME said: “All three previous albums come to heads on album closer ‘RABi’, with a slinky saxophone here and Americana-flecked guitar there. It’s the perfect summation of ‘i, i’ in its entirety, with contradictory instrumental lines gorgeously meshing together, turning the older sounds into something fresh and new. But it also feels bittersweet. With ‘i, i’ marking the end of the album cycle, the possibility of any future Bon Iver music is uncertain.”