Bon Iver’s For Emma, Forever Ago: The Power of Pain

Years ago, I discovered and obsessed over the song “Flume” by Bon Iver. It was a random song I happened to find, but now is so memorable of that time. I had always known who the artist was because of the popularity of the song “Skinny Love,” but I never really listened to his music until this time, in which I got to explore the entirety of his discography. It wasn’t a genre of music that I often listened to, yet I kept coming back to his first album For Emma, Forever Ago, especially when I go back home in the northern Midwest a couple hours away from his hometown. His music feels raw and emotional, not only because of the lyrics but because of the way the layering, yet minimalist music builds upon each other making it almost irreplicable. For Emma, Forever Ago is a short album yet so impactful. There isn't really a different way to describe it, than being a beautiful piece of emotion and pain. 

Bon Iver wrote For Emma, Forever Ago in an environment unlike his daily life. He discusses how he had a rough year involving a break up and sickness that caused him to isolate in a cold Wisconsin cabin in the middle of nowhere. His work came from a place of separation and change in life. In this way, his creative process had a period of incubation and insight. He physically let his life incubate in a remote cabin that allowed him to have insight into emotions that he would not have been able to put into music otherwise. In The Creative Act: A Way of Being, Rick Rubin writes:

“Sometimes disengaging 

Is the best way to engage.” 

He discusses how the creative process, specifically for musicians like him, sometimes reaches a point that someone needs to step away to let a solution, or in this case Bon Iver’s music, to surface. This process with incubation and insight was so powerful in creating his album. 

It was almost shocking the first time I learned that the album was written in 2007, because it feels so relevant even today when my life isn’t like his when he wrote it. Rubin again writes:

“Art creates a profound connection 

Between the artist and the audience.

Through that connection, 

        both can heal.”  

Bon Iver’s motivation in writing could come from this idea of Rubins, that creativity can stem from one’s insecurities, guiding art. For Emma, Forever Ago was most likely formed from pain, yet listeners don’t need to feel the same pain, to have a spark of creativity now from his. His work is shaped by experience, but is able to be reshaped by other people’s experience. Over 15 years later, the album still feels life changing, both with emotions and creativity, in a new way for everyone to feel.

Source to Read More: https://berkeleybside.com/a-quintessential-fall-album-bon-ivers-for-emma-forever-ago/