Album Review: The Shouting Matches - Grownass Man

For all of Bon Iver's beauty, the musical landscapes that the band paints and the layered love songs that they are (rightly or wrongly) known for, one element of their music often escapes from view. The band, especially main man Justin Vernon, has a deep love of the blues. 

The Shouting Matches is that very same Justin Vernon's latest project, and one in which the blues get a serious workout. Teaming up with Phil Cook – with whom he has previously played in a band called DeYarmond Edison during the mid-noughties – and Brian Moen, even those familiar with Bon Iver's oeuvre (say that ten times) would at times struggle to find the similarities between the two bands.

For blues fans, that's totally alright. There are Wilco-laced guitar solos on the band's debut, Grownass Man, like that on lead single, Gallup, NM, and there are painful harmonica-driven numbers like the rambunctious Heaven Knows. The album is at times a rollicking train ride, hurtling through America's Deep South; at others it is poignant and lyrical. There's no hint that the band is merely a “side project” for Grammy-winning, million album-selling Bon Iver, such is the camaraderie evident through the layered vocals and simple arrangements.

Through various guises (such as the aforementioned DeYarmond Edison) the three band members have crossed each other's paths again and again, although Grownass Man is the first taste of their recorded work.

And it's an absolute gem. Anyone with more than a wholly superficial appreciation of music will fall in love with its simplicity. Beautiful music needs not horns and strings – rather a shared vision and friendship. The Shouting Matches have these qualities in spades.