By Leighton Ginn
One of the acts I’ve wanted to see for a while has been Bon Iver, as I think Justin Vernon is one of the best vocalist out there.
Halocene is such a beautiful song, and his cover of Bonnie Raitt’s “I Can’t Make you Love Me” is extraordinary.
But I hadn’t read much about Bon Iver before watching them at Coachella this year during the second weekend. So when I heard the auto tune and the altering of his vocals, it threw me off.
My initial reaction was, “with a beautiful voice like that, why mess with it?”
But I know artists like to branch out, so I tried to give it a chance. But to be honest, it was hard to really soak it in because it did throw me off. It wasn’t bad, but I wasn’t prepared for it. I will have to listen more to his new CD, “22, A Million.” I want to listen to more of it and get an honest take on his new direction.
Yet, I think Bon Iver came up with the signature moment for Coachella 2017 for me when there was a surprise appearance by Bruce Hornsby and Jenny Lewis. They performed together on Hornsby hit, “The End of the Innocence.”
Bringing together three rich and beautiful voices together for that song just gave me goosebumps the whole song.
And it was cool because there was no introduction. I thought it was just a cover, but as I listened, “hey, isn’t that Bruce Hornsby?”
When I got home that night, I searched YouTube to see if anyone posted a video of it. Once I found it, I was sharing it with all my music friends.
Coachella can sometimes be a pain. With so many people, as they expanded to 120,000 this year, it’s can test your patience.
But “The End of the Innocence” is a moment that makes it all worth it.
Ginn & Topics 