Bon Iver has a new album coming out and a weird relationship with commas.
Said album is titled i, i, and it’s releasing August 30; two new songs and videos have been shared along with the album’s announcement. They are “Jelmore” and “Faith.”
Every Bon Iver album title has a comma. For Emma, Forever Ago has perhaps Justin Vernon’s most grammatical use of the classic punctuation mark — sure, the name doesn’t constitute an independent clause by itself, but we can at least imagine it as part of a grammatically correct larger whole, with the phrase “forever ago” functioning probably as an appositive. 2011’s Bon Iver, Bon Iver is the one people forget has a comma, since everyone thinks that one’s just called Bon Iver. And the comma use in i, i feels of a piece with that of 2016’s 22, A Million, inscrutably divorced from the realm of conventional grammar, more an abstract dividing line between the two elements comprising each title.
But wait! If we turn our eyes to the tracklisting (which we can conveniently do below), we see Vernon’s playful use of the comma continues with the absurdly punctuated “Holyfields,”. This one seems like a call back to the made up town/state combos from the tracklist of Bon Iver, Bon Iver, but with the state abbreviation left off. What does it all mean??
Hmm. Maybe it means you can preorder i, I here.
It might also mean that Bon Iver has also announced a large number of tour dates, which you can find below.
And speaking of “below,” that’s exactly where you can find the videos for the new tracks “Jelmore” and “Faith:”
i, i tracklisting:
01. Yi
02. iMi
03. We
04. Holyfields,
05. Hey, Ma
06. U (Man Like)
07. Naeem
08. Jelmore
09. Faith
10. Marion
11. Salem
12. Sh’Diah
13. RABi
Bon Iver tour dates:
07.11.19 - Mad Cool Festival - Madrid, ES
07.13.19 - NOS Alive - Oeiras, PT
07.16.19 - Les Nuits De Fourvière - Lyon, FR
07.17.19 - Castello Scaligero, Villafranca di Verona - Verona, IT
07.19.19 - Schlachthof - Wiesbaden, DE
07.21.19 - Melt Festival - Gräfenhainichen, DE
08.31.19 - KettleHouse Amphitheater - Missoula, MT*
09.02.19 - Gerald R. Ford Amphitheater - Vail, CO∞
09.03.19 - Red Rocks Amphitheatre - Morrison, CO∞
09.04.19 - Maverik Center - Salt Lake City, UT∞
09.06.19 - The Gorge Amphitheatre - George, WA∞
09.07.19 - Pacific Coliseum - Vancouver, BC∞
09.10.19 - Theater of the Clouds - Portland, OR∞
09.12.19 - Chase Center - San Francisco, CA∞
09.15.19 - The Forum - Los Angeles, CA∞
10.03.19 - Xcel Energy Center - St. Paul, MN†
10.04.19 - Allstate Arena - Rosemont, IL†
10.06.19 - Scotiabank Arena - Toronto, ON†
10.08.19 - Schottenstein Center - Columbus, OH†
10.10.19 - Wells Fargo Center - Philadelphia, PA†
10.11.19 - Barclays Center - Brooklyn, NY‡
10.15.19 - TD Garden - Boston, MA†
10.17.19 - The Anthem - Washington, DC†
10.18.19 - The Anthem - Washington, DC†
10.19.19 - PNC Arena - Raleigh, NC†
* Indigo Girls
∞ Sharon Van Etten
† Feist
‡ Yo La Tengo
More about: Bon Iver
