Welcome to the world of Justin Vernon. It ain't no ordinary place, you see; it’s impenetrable at times, a bit dark and joyless at times, but always with a deep tenderness at heart.

He made his name via the mystique-filled debut album For Emma, Forever, the mystique amplified by the fact it was made in some kind of isolated cabin, with few modern conveniences. Bearded, isolated, rudimentary. Yes, he inadvertently helped to kick-start the 'cabin-folk' genre, with future cabin-folk press releases happening to mention that so and so's new masterpiece was made in the barren wastes of isolation. Somewhere off the beaten track. Somewhere romantically liberating for the rest of us to dream about.

Vernon is also, not unsurprisingly, a little bit sick of the fame thing; he’s been kicking against the circus that is a regular part of the promoting and selling of a record, although of course he understands the necessity for it, in one form or another. So, he decided to take the unusual step, at least for a non A-leaguer, of hosting a press conference. Here, the new album was played in its entirety, and he spoke at length about it, taking many questions from the floor of journalists, thereby not having to undergo countless, individual interviews. Unsurprisingly, it worked for him in terms of publicity mileage. And, thankfully, it has worked for me.

Because, without that conference or the accompanying lyrics sent in advance of the official album release, I would have very little clue as to what Vernon is singing about on 22, A Million or what has informed the album, such is its cloak of obscurity and esoteric language. To say it is impenetrable, abstract, dense and scrappy, would be only telling part of the story. Lyrically, Vernon continues further down the path of deeply personal, bitty, sort of stream-of consciousness narratives. But musically, it’s very adventurous, reaching far beyond his previous comfort zone, where a guitar, a few traditional extras, and a deft production hand, were all that was needed in creating the eerie atmospherics of his previous two albums. And purposefully, he has partly shrugged off the overwhelmingly melancholic nature of his previous work; this time mashing it up, via digital manipulation, to startling, if at times jarring, effect.

We should be grateful. There were several points when Vernon almost jacked it in, and scrapped the album due to ongoing uncertainty, and self-described mental issues. He had become plagued by panic attacks and anxiety, and battling the feeling that; “I had this huge idea and I didn’t have the wherewithal to go through with it.” But, upon seeing some light at the end of a tunnel, and collaborating with musicians such as Kanye West and Ryan Olson (of Gayngs) along the way, he battled on, beginning with the opening track, the first song he wrote, ’22 (OVER S∞∞N)’, the start of a weird and wonderful journey that took him to some unexpected – and healing – places.

22, A Million is a difficult album. Not just because of the difficult-to-read song titles but also because of some of the difficult-to-listen-to music, such as the opener. Bearing a resemblance to the spooky, repetitive, auto-tuned voice of Laurie Anderson’s ‘O Superman’. Here he has sampled Mahalia Jackson’s ‘How I Got Over’, an old gospel/civil rights song, as well as his own voice, and doctored it to give a sense of otherworldliness and allied this to the musical figures coming in and out of the mix (including a saxophone) and other electronica. “Where you gonna look for confirmation? / And if it’s ever gonna happen / So as I’m standing at the station… it might be over soon.” sings Vernon, his vocal modulated and distorted, the sonic palette richly altered, and yet having the effect of making Vernon sound even more fragile than ever.

Looking to beat out the sadness inherent in most of his previous work, Vernon cranks it up in places, such as the vocoder-rich and crunchy tech beats based ’10 d E A T h b R E a s T ??’ that also features a near-cacophony of sounds, as well as a purposefully uncredited Stevie Nicks sample. He gets the vocoder out again for the other-worldly voice on ‘715 – CRΣΣKS’ as well as snippets of ’33 “GOD”’, Vernon’s big, powerful and more controlled vocal performance allied to more crushing beats, again creating a disconcerting atmosphere, but also intoxicating. Radical for sure, and a potentially jarring listening experience for some. Vernon perhaps pre-emptively advised, via his press conference, that a good place to listen to the album might be; “A place where you can feel alone maybe, or a moment of reflection,” further explaining that for him; “Music in general is about self discovery, self understanding." In other words, it is a deeply personal work, one that will have some difficulty translating to the public at large.

Vernon reverts to his previous style for the more acoustic-based opening of ’29 #Strafford APTS’, but again takes the song to unexpected places. Effects and strings inch their way into view, Vernon again doctoring his vocal, and using unusual words and turn of phrases in describing some kind of feeling and place (almost invariably within his locale, a place he invokes on many occasions): “A womb, an empty robe, enough, you’re rolling up, you’re holding it, you’re fabric now, paramind…” he sings in typically un-narrative fashion.

Vernon succeeds best when he more subtly marries the old with the new. On ‘666 ?’ there’s a beautiful song within; simple guitar notes embellished with a repeating keyboard motif, double bass, and percussion, even if the lyrics remain opaque. Here, as on the gentler ambience of ’21 M??N WATER’, Vernon fuses sounds that could be a mismatch, but, in his hands, develops into a cohesive whole, meticulously layering doctored electronica onto more traditional instrumentation. It’s a method that also works brilliantly on ‘8 (circle)’, which sees saxophonist Mike Lewis duet with Vernon on a saxophone vocoder, a minimalist, intimate and meditative musical conservation, where you can hear the reeds and buttons being pressed, and the breath of the players, topped with Vernon’s most straight forward vocal performance, a soulful outpouring of impressionistic anxiety. And ‘00000 Million’, which features a sample from Fionn Regan’s ‘Abacus’, is a fitting soulful, gospel-inflected finale that wraps up the immense personal journey that Vernon has been on these last few years. Finally, he is able to lay to rest at least some of those troubles: “Must’ve been forces, that took me on them wild courses / Who knows how many poses, that I’ve been in".

Dedicated in part to singer-songwriter Richard Buckner (he admires Buckner’s flowing and impressionistic lyricism), 22, A Million is imbued with a strong sense of trying things; where a stream-of-consciousness can help to provide some kind of meaning after the event. “It’s my self-preservation thing,” Vernon has said about the album, which nevertheless is brimming with love and tenderness throughout, along with a great deal of questioning, too. Part deconstruction, part re-imagining, part woodsman, part digital manipulation, 22, A Million is a unique album from a unique artist.

Jeff Hemmings

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