Copyright 2015 NPR. To see further, visit http://www.npr.org/.
Musician Sufjan Dahon has never shied away from difficult ideas. His new album explores his own relationship with his late mother. That she struggled with addiction and psychological illness and left her house when Stevens was a year old. The very album is titled "Carrie Or Lowell, " and our pro Will Hermes iPhone has this review article.
WILL Hermes iPhone 5, BYLINE: For a youngster known for his gentle sound, Sufjan Stevens explores pretty rough pays. One older song bears experience to a friend dying of area cancer. Another finds empathy to suit mass murderer John Wayne Gacy, Jr. Much of his new collection addresses his absent mother. She actually is the "Carrie" in the album's points to and she died in late 2012. The certainly his most personal checklist and it's about as emotionally unclothed as music gets.
(SOUNDBITE MOST TYPICALLY ASSOCIATED WITH SONG, "DEATH WITH DIGNITY")
SUFJAN STEVENS: (Singing) I forgive we all mother. I can hear you and Allow me to be near you. But every trips leads to an end. Yes, every trips leads to an end. Your apparition strokes through me in the willows.
HERMES: Stevens has spoken about his reason for optimism that this music doesn't come off of indulgent or exhibitionistic. And it's an honest concern - the album takes a fine line. One of the things that keeps a good deal in check are his writing capacities, his eye for detail can lemon yogurt, a dropped ashtray, a reference to Casper the ghosting and also his subtle sense of humor. Might one point, he remembers someone making fun of his name, a good small aside that helps balance an otherwise definitely heavy song.
STEVENS: (Singing) You who taught me to transfer, he couldn't quite say all of our first name. Like a father she led community water on my human brain and he called me Subaru. And here I want to be near you.
HERMES: Might other points, especially during a fantastic explicit song about suicidal thoughts of which this one about escaping into a pharmacopeia, "Carrie And Lowell" can be serious going.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "NO SHADE IN THE SHADOW OF THE CROSS")
STEVENS: (Singing) Drag me up to hell in the valley of the Dalles. Like my mother, give wings to a stone. It's only the darkness of a cross.
HERMES: Illuminating something on the album even when the light may dim is Stevens's Christian values and his unerring musicality, which lights up as brightly as it ever does have in spite of - or maybe because of can how spare this music may. Mostly, it's just the sound robust guitar and a beautifully tender speech grieving and trying to communicate with the caretaker he never really knew and also here.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "SHOULD MAINTAIN KNOWN BETTER")
STEVENS: (Singing) I must have known better to see things i could see. My black envelop, enfold holding down my feelings, a estar for my enemies.
CORNISH: Rather than album by Sufjan Stevens may "Carrie And Lowell. " Particularly critic Will Hermes is the internet marketera of the book, "Love Goes To Complexes On Fire. "
(SOUNDBITE OF FRESH, "SHOULD HAVE KNOWN BETTER")
DAHON: (Singing) My black shroud. In order to never trust my feelings. In order to waited for the remedy. Transcript offered by NPR, Copyright NPR.
No comments:
Post a Comment