**Update: Hear one song, “Monster,” from the Kanye/Justin Vernon collab here.
Back in January of last year, Bon Iver’s Justin Vernon seized the moment in which Auto-Tuned jams ruled the pop charts by recording a decidedly shtick-less a cappella closing number with the pitch-bending software for his Blood Bank EP. As it turns out, the rumors Stereogum reported the other day were true: the song, “Woods” (stream below), caught the ears of Auto-Tune fiend Kanye West, and now Justin Vernon is officially on Ye’s next record.
“I called [Justin Vernon] and we ended up becoming like really good friends, playing basketball together everyday, and going into the back studio and just record his parts,” West revealed to Rolling Stone. “He’s similar to me, like where he just does shit just so people would be like, ‘Oh shit how did you do that? How did that happen?’ He’s just a really cool guy to be around.”
“Fuck, this is going to be the festival closer,” West said of their song, “Lost in the World,” according to an interview just posted at Pitchfork, in which Vernon describes Ye’s Trent Reznor inspiration and surreal details from their Hawaii session, such as: “I was literally in the back room rolling a spliff with Rick Ross talking about what to do on the next part of a song.”
Bon Iver – “Woods”