Introduction
Bon Iver wrote Brackett, WI for Red Hot's charity album, Dark Was the Night, a 31-song[1] Indiefolk compilation released in early 2009. The song relies almost exclusively on a prominent, repeated bass line and Justin Vernon's falsetto, creating a chilling nostalgia for both an old town and a lost love. It's very difficult to understand the words that Vernon is truly singing here, however—and in fact that juxtaposition with what the listener think's she hears can add its own level of interpretation—but the following is what I've decided on for Brackett, WI, based on considerable back-and-forth on SongMeanings and my own repeated listening:
And easy swing had its time showing—slow bending ash.
And now it's a photo thing, and swing hasn't had it.And here we are rebuilding roads right by roosting towns;
it's just like the love—the one that's never been enough.So I'm counting on your fingers 'cause you've reattached the twitch,
and if you go unpin it I will die along the ditches.And every summer is a hot token to the cold coin take of us,
and every autumn singes with the business of sadness.And Fred had it wrong, Macy. Hon, he had it burned.
Now the curve in the county is nana's urn.So I'm counting on your fingers 'cause you've reattached the twitch,
and if you go unpin it I will die along the ditches.
It's remarkable what he can do in only 131 words. Initially, the town of Brackett, Wisconsin lies just south of Eau Claire—the city where Vernon grew up and currently resides—and either the town itself or what it represents holds obvious significance for him. At least two major themes are intertwined throughout Brackett, both of which take advantage of small-town imagery and the sadness that it readily evokes, along with repeated references to fire and burning that complement Vernon's tormented emotions toward his home town and the woman there he loves.
This essay hopes to scratch the surface of what Brackett means, as the song not only contains so much unspoken depth and sadness but has had particular meaning for me.
The Town
The first verse opens shortly after a brief introductory bass riff, describing an old, dilapidated swing either outside Vernon's home or that of a close friend. If each verse didn't begin with "And" I would be tempted to hear "An easy swing," which makes slightly more grammatical sense here, but regardless the swing "had its time showing" and is noticeably aged and weathered.
Ash, or more commonly White Ash, is a type of tree whose wood is frequently used in constructing furniture. It's very strong and elastic and works well with "slow bending," or bending the wood through the use of steam. Though strong, it is not extensively used outdoors due to its heartwood's "low durability to ground contact," typically perishing within five years. This would explain Vernon's observation that the swing had its age showing and that now it is just a "photo thing," remembered only in photographs. Importantly, the type of wood that Vernon observes is the first instance of the "burning" imagery that he works throughout Brackett. The swing is made of Ash, the remnants of an impassioned relationship from his youth that has either burned out or one Vernon himself destroyed by leaving.
Vernon dedicates an entire verse to this outdoor swing, which most likely has nostalgic meaning for him on a personal level; perhaps he remembers the nights he spent on it with friends or the song's love interest, Macy, when he was younger. The lumber industry also drove Eau Claire through the 19th century, and the dilapidated wooden swing is just another prominent example for Vernon that the city itself has decayed over time through the loss of manufacturing jobs and the city's youth. Everything he remembers from his childhood is a "photo thing" now, and there just aren't enough photographs of Vernon, this swing, and the other memories of his youth in Brackett that remain.
The Girl
Brackett's town imagery continues in a separate form through the second verse, as Vernon is now back in Brackett and beginning to "rebuild" whatever remains of his relationship with Macy. "Roosting" in this instance means some kind of peaceful, protected settling, or lying down for sleep or rest, and roosting sites are traditionally safe areas where animals congregate to sleep in large numbers. They're rebuilding roads—opening back up the lines of communication and slowly rediscovering their love for each other—right near this slow, sleepy town, Brackett. The town represents peace and safety for Vernon and perhaps the safety that comes with Macy as well, and this unlikely adjective provides a subtle, repeated inference of both of these loves "roasting" or rekindling.
It is unclear what, exactly, is "just like the love . . . that's never been enough," however. While Vernon may be referring to either the act of rebuilding this relationship or Brackett—one of the roosting towns—itself, the fact that "it" is in the singular here initially indicates that the act of rebuilding is the subject. It is particularly ambiguous how that act would be just like their love, unless Vernon is directly comparing the physical act of rebuilding roads in a town (or some other kind of literal repair work, possibly following a disaster and perhaps the reason he is back in Brackett to begin with, which Verse 4 may reveal) with the metaphorical act of rebuilding a relationship, but this seems unlikely.
I think it is far more likely that Vernon is in fact referring to Brackett here, as that final phrase—"the one that's never been enough"—is directly applicable to both Macy's love and his love for Brackett. No matter how strongly he feels for her, she has never been enough to keep him home and together with her. Vernon's love for Brackett and his hometown has likewise never been important enough to keep him there or content with the small town. Though neither has been able to persuade him from leaving for more important things until now, or goals or opportunities that Vernon thought at one point were more important, the chorus indicates that he is finally aware.
The Twitch
It is in the chorus where Vernon realizes that he needs this woman, that she must force him to stay for his own best interest and make the decision he cannot. He is "counting on [her] fingers," relying fully on their ability to securely tie him down with a "twitch"—some restraining device similar to a noose or muzzle, and often used on horses to hold them during a painful operation. It's an extreme solution to a problem Vernon cannot fix himself, and he acknowledges that if Macy "unpins" it—allows him to leave Brackett once again—any hope he has of living happily with her is lost.
The Business of Sadness
Following the first chorus, Brackett returns to the interplay between small town imagery and his broken or breaking relationship. Indeed it is the summers when Vernon returns to Brackett and his relationship is reenergized or restarted—perhaps when the school year is over or when Vernon can visit throughout some form of long-distance relationship—providing some amount of "heat" to an otherwise cold existence.
Interestingly, Vernon's use of "token" may apply in at least three ways here depending on its meaning. The summers serve as a kind of representation of their larger feelings as a whole toward each other, a token of what they want, despite the distance that is generally between them. The summers may also serve as a memento or keepsake to a memory of what once was, a relationship and a love that they could or did have. Perhaps most likely, and an interpretation that coincides with the "business" imagery established in this verse, is that these summers are some kind of proprietary currency for them—a token coin—that they earn and cash in at the end of each summer for the cold coin "take," or profit, that is the remainder and reality of their love. The "cold coin take of us" is the cool, distant, waning joy that they experience throughout the year apart, the profit they earn from their business together.
This lies nicely against Vernon's observation that Brackett remains solely engaged in the business of sadness. Whereas the town was a thriving economy at one point, it now trades in despair and, for Vernon, lost or impossible love, much the way he and Macy trade burning summers for three seasons of cold distance. It is the autumns that "singe" with this business, when Vernon must leave again at the end of the summer.
It is very difficult to hear "hot token" from the way Vernon sings that line, however, and it is almost as if he says "every summer is a heart talking," coinciding with the rhythmic, heart-beat drums and bass line at that point in the song as well as the general idea that their hearts are finally together during these summers. Either way it is a nice thought.
The Burn
Though somewhat of a continuation, Brackett's final verse is its most cryptic and, sadly, the most likely source of Vernon's true intent behind writing this song.
And Fred had it wrong, Macy. It is unclear who Fred is specifically—family member, mutual friend, or someone else close to both Vernon and Macy—or whether his identification is even necessary to the song's meaning, and it is even less clear as to what Fred had wrong. While the entire song is written with the understanding that Macy is physically with him, this is also the only instance where Vernon refers to her by name, creating an added degree of significance to these thoughts and Vernon's impending explanation to her after this line.
Hon, he had it burned. Vernon switches to an endearing pet-name when referring to Macy again, an attempt to soften the blow before he reveals something that she had not previously known. It is clear from the next line that either Fred had the body of Vernon's (or Macy's) nana cremated into ashes following her death, that he burned down a home containing this woman's existing ashes that are now lost, or, less likely, the woman actually died in some type of house or structure fire. Whatever the underlying facts, they may be the motivation behind Vernon's frequent use of fire imagery throughout Brackett, and this later view lends additional support to both the idea that there was a tragedy in his or her family that brought Vernon back to Brackett this time as well as the literal half of Vernon's "rebuilding" in Verse 2 that lay next to the figurative relationship rebuilding.
Now the curve in the county is nana's urn. While it is additionally possible that "urn" here is also a figurative, euphemistic attempt to describe their nana's tragic death, Vernon's use of "urn" is far more likely to reference cremation. The ashes are all that remain of her (or all that formerly remained), and after having been spread over Brackett they now make up the "curve in the county"—perhaps some hill or road of meaning to them, or perhaps spread there unintentionally when the home in which her ashes remained was burnt to the ground.
For Occam's sake, it seems most likely that Fred lied to Macy or someone close to her (or was simply incorrect) regarding either Macy's home or the true nature of her grandmother's death. Whatever actually took place has caused considerable turmoil for Macy and difficulties arising from her and Vernon's distance, as this final verse truly brings home the sadness that this town evokes for Vernon, the guilt he experiences for leaving, and the justification for asking Macy to prevent him from ever leaving again.
Posted August 9, 2011; edited August 13, 2011.
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