We’re light years from the hunting cabins of Wisconsin now. Six neon art podiums, arranged in a council-like circle, enclose racks of keyboards and two drum kits. Curtains of light enshroud the stage in angular sheets. A flock of floating mirrors hung from the lighting rig reflect beams of light at skewed, flowing angles, much as Bon Iver bends music.
The stage set for the first of Justin Vernon’s two Wembley shows reveals just how far the haunting alt-folk artist of 2007’s For Emma, Forever Ago has mutated. Since that cult breakthrough album, sparsely recorded in a heartbroken fever in his father’s log cabin in the woods, the Wisconsin falsetto troubadour of old has evolved into a cutting-edge electro-soul pioneer. Not that he looks the part, appearing amid the technological tangle with a heavy beard, backwards baseball cap and chunky headphones. He looks more like the sort of Midwestern local radio DJ who’d get fired for barricading himself in his studio and playing Creedence Clearwater Revival for 24 hours straight.
