Bon Iver: SABLE, fABLE

2025 marks the beginning of Bon Iver's next chapter: "SABLE, fABLE," released on Jagjaguwar, is the first album from Justin Vernon's project in six years and features a love story underpinned by lush, radiant pop music. While the album begins with the vulnerable relief of last fall's "SABLE," EP, the triptych segues seamlessly into a new, nine-song saga where one person becomes two, darkness morphs into salmon-colored beauty, and sadness turns to unbridled joy. While SABLE is a bleak and lonely reckoning with a pain that has long defined the past, fABLE looks to a vibrant future full of light, meaning and possibility. Ahead of its April release, Bon Iver will officially enter the fABLE era with "Everything Is Peaceful Love" on Valentine's Day. The single will be released alongside a music video directed and edited by filmmaker John Wilson (HBO's How To with John Wilson). "SABLE, fABLE" was produced by Justin Vernon and Jim-E Stack and recorded primarily at Vernon's April Base in Wisconsin after years of studio downtime during a renovation. The concept for the album was conceived on 2/22/22 when Stack arrived there with Danielle Haim. Snowed in for several days, Vernon and Haim's voices united on "If Only I Could Wait," a duet with a crucial perspective about not having the power to be the best version of yourself outside of the glow of a new love. If SABLE was the prologue, a prologue in darkness, a controlled burn that paves the way for new possibilities, then fABLE is the book that follows. Where SABLE was a work of solitude, fABLE is an outstretched hand. Bright, squiggly pop music wraps around Vernon's voice as he focuses on a new and beautiful era. With each song, his eyes are fixed on a specific person. It's love, which means there's an intense clarity, focus and honesty in fABLE. It's a portrait of a man flooded and overwhelmed by that first encounter ("Everything Is Peaceful Love"). It is a tableau characterized by sex and unbridled desire ("Walk Home"). A man, full of light and drive, who sees a whole future ahead of him. There is something undeniably healing about infatuation, and the intense clarity, focus, honesty and celebration it brings to these songs. Yet the shadow of SABLE still lingers in the air, and old feelings can return, even if you've made the effort to start over. Like a fable, each track conveys a lesson, and fABLE is about the selfless rhythm required when you're entangled with another person or lover. The penultimate song - and by extension the whole album - is a promise. He's ready to find that rhythm.