Sufjan Stevens
Sufjan Stevens
Sufjan Stevensis an American singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist. He first came to wider recognition with the 2000 album, A Sun Came, which was released on the Asthmatic Kitty label he co-founded with his stepfather. He is perhaps best known for his 2005 album, Illinois, which hit number one on the Billboard Top Heatseekers chart, and for the single "Chicago" from that album...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionMusician
Date of Birth1 July 1975
CountryUnited States of America
I still feel like I have a lot to learn in the realm of sound experimentation, and I think I would like things to get noisier and weirder and more distressed and more aggressive, but I don't know if that's something that would be suitable for public consumption.
I think I get a lot of ideas from when I was a kid, listening to Casey Kasem's 'American Top 40.'
I was working on several states simultaneously. The tone of the music for Illinois seemed much more exciting and challenging to me. The music itself seemed to evoke a very big character.
It's really about a sensory experience and getting fully involved and fully entrenched in the pageantry of Illinois.
It's really about a sensory experience and getting fully involved and entrenched in the pageantry of Illinois,
Oh the glory when he took our place / But he took my shoulders and he shook my face / And he takes and he takes and he takes,
Everyone seems really concerned for me now about the prospect. They use this word 'daunting' all the time.
It puts us in the attitude of respect for our audience. It's important on every level to have a kind of attitude of unification in some way. I don't have that naturally. I'm not a great performer, so we have to do everything we can, do the exercises, to prepare.
I've been trying to challenge myself to be more explicit. I've always liked punk rock and Sonic Youth. I make that music privately, but I've never released it.
program. ''It puts us in the attitude of respect for our audience. I think it's important on every level to have a kind of attitude of unification in some way. . . . I don't really have that naturally. I'm not a great performer, so we have to do everything we can, do the exercises, to prepare.
So I'm a little worried about that though I know I don't have to worry about these things in the way, I don't know, that Cher has to worry about it.
My anxiety level of my own work and what I'm doing and focusing on my art and all of that stuff? That's fundamental.
Morals, principles and laws are when faith is reduced to standards and those standards basically just bind us, and we become prejudicial, racist, self-serving when we're guided by these laws... When a developed country uses Christianity in its policies, in government, in maintaining corporate wealth, that's a bastardized rendering of a faith.
Pop music is so structured, and I'm excited to try and challenge that in my own work.