The November 09 issue of Paste magazine has an interesting article about Sufjan Stevens. For those who may not know, Sufjan Stevens seemed to come virtually out of nowhere in 2005 with an album called "Illinoise", the second in Stevens' "USA Project" wherein he planned to make an album about each of the 50 states, Michigan having been the first in this series. Illinoise was a huge success by indie standards, selling well over 300,000 albums and the praise it garnered was well earned. I think it's safe to say that Illinoise doesn't quite sound like anything else out there, a peculiar mix of folk, choral, symphonic, and pop arrangements. It was a self aware concept album on a subject that shouldn't have been interesting but was and for the last 4 years we've been wondering when the next state's album would be done.
As it turns out the success of Illinoise may have been more than Sufjan Stevens has hoped for. In what he describes as an existential creative crisis, Stevens' recoiled from the idea of the "USA Project" and music altogether, until presented with the chance to create an original score and performance for the Brooklyn Academy of Music's Next Wave Festival recently. The resultant album "BQE" about the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway was recently released, features no vocals, and is very much a film score. Stevens still finds himself with something of a conundrum in so far as the future of his music goes however. Questioning the validity of the album as a format itself (considering that we're moving into a digital age and the +30/-70 minute format is very much based on the constraints of past analog formats) Steven's appears to be reevaluating not just the music, but the concepts behind it as well.
All of this it would seem, brought on by the shock of sudden (if not limited) mainstream success. And while personally, I would have loved to have heard more albums in the same vein as Greetings From Michigan and Illinoise, I suppose I can't fault Sufjan Stevens for the direction he's chosen. Some musicians, when faced with the fleeting promise of mainstream success and adoration, choose to run with the crowd and play to the masses or at the very least become so aware of their new status that their resulting product seems watered down by comparison. It's something that those of us who are more likely to have sought out such music long before it ever became popular call "selling out." Stevens' seems to have done the exact opposite though and is practically boycotting himself or least the version of himself that was lauded by the mainstream. Truth be told, while I appreciate a more Radiohead or Modest Mouse-esque approach to anti-sell-out stardom, where the artist manages to be aware of their impact and acceptance in the mainstream, but continues to innovate and play to please themselves first, I given Stevens credit for innovating in retreat.
While there may never be another state album in the vein of Illinoise or another state album period, Stevens is very obviously interested in exploring the future not just of his own music, but of the whole concept of the art as we progress through this digital age. I'm not expecting miracles, but as enamored as I am of the concept album and analog media in general, it will be interesting to see if artists like Sufjan Stevens can find a way to innovate the realm of digital music, in ways that aren't just a mimicry of what we already have available on analog.
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