New York, NY (Top40 Charts) Today, the story of DeYarmond Edison begins to be told. Formed by Brad Cook, Phil Cook, Justin Vernon and Joe Westerlund, they were a band driven by big dreams and deep bonds - four childhood friends who built a musical connection that was too good to last. In the 17 years that have passed since DeYarmond Edison broke apart at the very height of their collective power, each member has gone on to establish their individual legacy through the indispensable work of projects like Bon Iver, Megafaun and so many more. But before then they succeeded and shattered together: out August 18th on Jagjaguwar, Epoch is a massive and maximalist box set that explores the saga like never before, in unabashed and unabridged detail. Across five LPs, four CDs, and a 60,000-word biography from journalist and executive producer Grayson Haver Currin, the collection not only offers the definitive account of a short-lived group with an outsized impact, but reveals a universal tale of small-town transcendence, coming of age, and collective artistic ambition, even when it became too much to bear.
At its core, Epoch is also a vast feat of vulnerability, and a testament to the magic that can happen when no one is looking. Many of the 83 recordings are being heard by others for the very first time, accompanied by dozens of previously unpublished photos from backyards and basements, and revelatory conversations with all four band members and numerous others who define the history of DeYarmond Edison. From their true headwaters in turn-of-the-century Wisconsin, to the 2005-2006 era of experimentation and eventual implosion in North Carolina, to the ensuing and celebrated solo careers, the collection fully traces the group's complex evolution, as the past returns to haunt and heal.
Within the physical Epoch box, designed over the course of several years by Miles Johnson, Nate Utesch and Alexa Terfloth, each LP is encapsulated with a unique symbol representing the dynamics within the band at that given moment, while color palettes evoke time and place. In addition to Currin's 114-page, 11-chapter book, every album comes with a corresponding essay that illustrates the context and events that helped create that specific body of music.
Much of the first of Epoch's five LPs, All of Us Free, was released decades ago in tiny physical editions, if at all. Two of those songs, one entirely unreleased, are now available on digital platforms - DeYarmond Edison's "As Long As I Can Go" and Phil Cook and Justin Vernon's "Feel The Light." Spanning November 1998-July 2005, All of Us Free brings DeYarmond Edison back to its earliest iteration, as a group of Eau Claire high schoolers who called themselves Mount Vernon. Writing about the idylls of Wisconsin's Chippewa Valley - in a moment dominated by Bill Clinton and
Dave Matthews Band's
Crash - they blended funk, rock, reggae and jazz with big-stage gumption and outsized dreams. Two albums later, Mount Vernon's utopian bubble burst and the band became known as the DeYarmond Edison Quartet, sputtering to life with a debut LP they self-recorded in the nude at a local Presbyterian church. With songs such as "As Long As I Can Go," the set of heartland folk-rock showcased a burgeoning sense of restraint, and a blooming weirdness that would soon take shape.
Epoch also includes DeYarmond Edison's second studio album, Silent Signs, remastered and pressed to vinyl for the first time. On highlights like "Bones," they can be heard coming into their own, finishing the record just weeks before they faced a decision to either stay in Wisconsin and settle into old patterns, or leave town to try and grow into the more interesting band they imagined they could be.
DeYarmond Edison arrived in their adopted home of Raleigh, NC on August 1, 2005, and days later would meet the person who would become their biggest fan, Grayson Haver Currin. They broke up in August 2006, but as Justin Vernon once said, "I learned more in that year than I've learned in the decade since." During twelve months of intense study and a monthly residency at the region's best art gallery, each band member reinvented themselves through their own disparate musical disciplines - be it grindcore or gospel, free jazz or phase pieces - in an attempt to outrun folk-rock doldrums and Midwestern melancholia. Brad Cook studied minimalism and electronics; Phil Cook dug deep into blues and bluegrass; Joe Westerlund expanded his improvisational skills and spontaneous composition; Justin Vernon tried out new and novel modes of vocals, falsetto included. The explosion of ideas were captured on the Epoch EP, which long lurked in a quiet corner of MySpace, but is finally celebrated in all its brilliance in the box set's expanded version, Epoch, etc.
That Was Then, the four-CD component of Epoch, unearths recordings from DeYarmond Edison's Bickett Gallery residency in North Carolina, as well as a triumphant 2006 show at Wisconsin's
Mabel Tainter theater, where they turned songs like
Velvet Underground's "All Tomorrow's Parties" inside out. After that, the band folded and what immediately followed is documented on Epoch with hazeltons, Vernon's solo precursor to Bon Iver's For Emma, Forever Ago, and Where We Belong, which combines tapes from the very first Megafaun rehearsal, different DeYarmond Edison reunions, and buried treasures like a cappella covers of obscure folk tunes, and an unheard song Vernon co-wrote with his Raleigh heroes, Ticonderoga.
In the wake of DeYarmond Edison's sudden dissolution, a decade of powerful music has emerged from each band member, creating an enduring impact even if you've never heard of them until today. So much more of that story will continue to be unveiled between now and Epoch's August 18th release date.
Epoch Tracklist
LP1 - All of Us Free
Mount Vernon - We Can Look Up
Mount Vernon - Morning
Phil Cook & Justin Vernon - Feel the Light
Justin Vernon - Breathe
DeYarmond Edison - The Lake
DeYarmond Edison - Dusty Road, So Kind
DeYarmond Edison - As Long as I Can Go
Justin Vernon - Right Down There in Your Tributary
DeYarmond Edison - The Orient
LP2 - Silent Signs
DeYarmond Edison - Lift
DeYarmond Edison - Silent Signs
DeYarmond Edison - Heroin(e)
DeYarmond Edison - Love Long Gone
DeYarmond Edison - First Impression
DeYarmond Edison - Bones
DeYarmond Edison -
Heart for Hire
DeYarmond Edison - Dead Anchor
DeYarmond Edison - Ragstock
DeYarmond Edison - We
DeYarmond Edison - Dash
DeYarmond Edison - Time to Know
LP3 - Epoch, etc.
DeYarmond Edison - Song for a Lover (of Long Ago)
DeYarmond Edison - Epoch
DeYarmond Edison - Baby Done Got Your Number
DeYarmond Edison - Brief Scene
DeYarmond Edison - Where We Belong
DeYarmond Edison - Red Shoes
DeYarmond Edison - Heroin(e)
LP4 - hazeltons
Justin Vernon - hazelton
Justin Vernon - frail sail
Justin Vernon - game night
Justin Vernon - easy
Justin Vernon - liner
Justin Vernon - song for a lover (of long ago)
Justin Vernon - hannah, my ophelia
LP5 - Where We Belong
Justin Vernon - Look Down That Long, Lonesome Road
Justin Vernon - Handwriting on the Wall
Ticonderoga (feat. Justin Vernon) - Hands Up
Justin Vernon - Funeral Lights
Megafaun - Lazy Suicide (Edit)
Megafaun (feat. Justin Vernon) - Carolina Days
Megafaun (feat. Justin Vernon,
Frazey Ford + Fight the Big Bull) - Trials, Troubles, Tribulations (Live from the Sydney Opera House, June 1, 2013)
Megafaun +
Bon Iver - Worried Mind
DeYarmond Edison - Set Me Free
CD1 - That Was Then - North Carolina - The Bickett Gallery Residency
DeYarmond Edison - What Are They Doing in
Heaven Today?
DeYarmond Edison - Step It Up and Go
DeYarmond Edison - Phil's Instrumental
DeYarmond Edison - Louis Collins
DeYarmond Edison - Old Dollar Mamie
DeYarmond Edison - Two Scenes
DeYarmond Edison - Sea Legs
DeYarmond Edison - Abel + Cain
DeYarmond Edison - Half Life
DeYarmond Edison - Afro Blue
CD2 - That Was Then - North Carolina - The Bickett Gallery Residency
DeYarmond Edison - Four Keyboard Phase in A
DeYarmond Edison - Cybernetic Meadow
DeYarmond Edison - Paul's Park
DeYarmond Edison - Justin's Phase Piece
DeYarmond Edison - Exercise in Abandonment
DeYarmond Edison - Bones
DeYarmond Edison - I Live The Life I Love (I Love The Life I Live)
DeYarmond Edison - My Beautiful Reward
DeYarmond Edison - A Satisfied Mind
DeYarmond Edison - Come and Go With Me (to That Land)
CD3 - That Was Then - Wisconsin - The
Mabel Tainter Concert
DeYarmond Edison - Intro
DeYarmond Edison - I Been Drinking
DeYarmond Edison - Down on the
Banks of the Ohio
DeYarmond Edison - Silent Signs
DeYarmond Edison - Please Find Me Here
DeYarmond Edison - Abel + Cain
DeYarmond Edison - We
DeYarmond Edison - Will the Circle Be Unbroken?
DeYarmond Edison - Afro Blue
CD4 - That Was Then - Wisconsin - The
Mabel Tainter Concert
DeYarmond Edison - Intro
DeYarmond Edison - The Longest Train
DeYarmond Edison - No Depression in Heaven
DeYarmond Edison - Red Shoes
DeYarmond Edison - Song for a Lover (of Long Ago)
DeYarmond Edison - Ain't No More Cane
DeYarmond Edison - easy
DeYarmond Edison - All Tomorrow's Parties
DeYarmond Edison - A Satisfied Mind
DeYarmond Edison - Come and Go With Me (to That Land)
