(pronounced "odds")
Oh my.
Sufjan is going crazy.
Remember Illinoise? 5 years ago? Yes, it's really been 5 years since he's produced a full-length album. It was so innocent. Soft, coherent, folky.
A lot has changed in 5 years.
I got the new Age Of Adz album two nights ago - came out last month - and I am sincerely stunned. This is not what I would have expected him to do.
The first song, Futile Devices, is (or, was what I thought would be) the Sufjan I remember. "It's been a long, long time since I've memorized your face." It's pretty subtle, mellow, and soothing.
Then you get to the next song, "Too Much". This is where it starts getting bizarre.
All kinds of little blips and technical noises and whatnot. This is present throughout the rest of the album. It's like a cross of his old stuff, his new thoughts, some noise, and some MGMT.
My favorite song so far: Age Of Adz.
Extremely dramatic intro, then it quiets to a Sufjan vocal that I've never heard from him. Sounds like he's disturbed. And the rest of the song is just amazing. The following line kind of shows his emotional issues and reflects his physical struggle mentioned below: "I've lost the will to fiight; I am not made for life." You have to give it a listen.
(Other songs that stick out in my mind:
I Want To Be Well - Sufjan seems pretty serious. Toward the end everything kind of builds up loudly; chorus is singing "I want to be well" while Sufjan is singing "I'm not f---ing around"
Vesuvius - Another toned-down song, he references himself in third person as a sort of monster
Impossible Soul - Hold god damn 25 minutes. I actually listened to the whole thing today, and it's not bad. Ends the album on "Boy, we can do so much together, it's not so impossible.")
There's actually an explanation to all of the electronic noise in the songs.
And an explanation of what happened to his style.
First:
There is this visual artist. His name is Royal Robertson. He is schizophrenic and paranoid, and his art has a lot of sci-fi basis. Sufjan, using one of Royal's pieces as his album cover (look above), incorporated this into his album. He attempted to bring the paintings to music life by adding some futurism to his music (and I do have to say, something with this style is completely unique and ahead of its time- that, or I'm just completely missing a whole scene of music like this).
Second:
Sufjan, sadly (or maybe not), is bored and dissatisfied with his old style. You don't hear one banjo in the entire album. But there are fleeting sections of just guitar + voice that sound excellent even when considering it with the rest of the song. I mean, I could describe the song Age Of Adz as a rethought, rearranged darker version of Come On! Feel The Illinoise.
In addition halfway through writing the album, he suffered through a virus that messed with his nervous system. Experience extreme pain. Not sure what virus it was. Throw that into this scheme.
So yeah, I think he's going crazy. But he's still a genius.
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