Bon Iver - Blood Bank - Official Video

"Blood Bank" opens with prodding acoustic strums and a series of hushed "oohs" (unmistakably reminiscent of Iron and Wine's lo-fi debut, The Creek Drank the Cradle), before Vernon begins: "I met you at the blood bank, we were looking at the bags," he explains, tossing off the kind of opening sentence most aspiring novelists spend their whole lives praying for. "Beach Baby", with its steel guitar and stomach-punching lyrics ("When you're out, tell your lucky one to know that you'll leave/ But don't you lock when you're fleeing, I'd like not to hear keys") feels spare and fleeting, disappearing into the runout groove before you realize it's over.

Bon Iver - Blood Bank - Official Video

The more you listen to "Blood Bank," the more attuned the song seems to 2019. Meeting someone at a blood bank is exactly the kind of quirky meet-cute you could envision in, say, a Girls episode; its somber, stripped-back tonality resembles the sad hip-hop suddenly inundating the Top 40; and the line "ain't this just like the present, to be showing up like this" may as well be a Jaden Smith tweet. Vernon's confounding poeticism feels like the musical embodiment of mixed signals: "It f*cks with your honor, it teases your head." 041b061a72