THE AGE OF ADZ, A NEW ALBUM FROM SUFJAN STEVENS

August 26th, 2010 , by

Last week we had the pleasure of releasing the All Delighted People EP (available for download for $5 and free stream right here). And the week before we announced a fall tour (tickets are still for sale here, but selling quickly).

And today, we are proud to announce the upcoming release of The Age of Adz (pronounced Odds), the first song-based full-length from Sufjan Stevens since 2005's Illinois. The Age of Adz will drop on October 12th (CD, MP3) with a double-LP following on November 9th.

For the next three weeks you can preorder the CD and LP  and receive an MP3 download on September 28th, two weeks before the release date. 

Preorder it all right here.

It’s much too soon to cast descriptive lots, but we can say the new album sounds nothing like the All Delighted EP (although it shares similar themes of love, loss, and the apocalypse). Nor is this new album built around any conceptual underpinning (no odes to states, astrology, or urban expressways). 

We can say it shows an extensive use of electronics (banjos and acoustic guitars give way to drum machines and analog synthesizers), and an obsession with cosmic fantasies (space, heaven, aliens, love), to create an explicit pop-song extravaganza, augmented by heavy orchestration, and maybe even a few danceable moments. Enjoy Your Rabbit meets the BQE. But with songs. Verse, chorus, bridge, backbeat. Gated reverb. Space echo. Get your boogey on. 

The “Adz” of the title loosely refers to the apocalyptic paintings of outsider artist Royal Robertson (1930-1997), whose work is used for the album cover, interior design, and as general inspiration for the tone of the album. 

A NEW EP FROM SUFJAN STEVENS

August 20th, 2010 , by

Raise your hands if you’re delighted to hear the good news that Sufjan is releasing an 8-song, 60-minute EP for digital download! Available immediately right here! As in right now! For only $5! From this up-and-coming-indie-DIY website, Bandcamp! (It will be available on iTunes, Amazon, and other corporate entities on Monday.)
 
The EP, All Delighted People, is built around two different versions of Sufjan’s long-form epic ballad "All Delighted People," a dramatic homage to the Apocalypse, existential ennui, and Paul Simon’s "Sounds of Silence." Sounds delightful, yes! The song was originally workshopped (oh we hate making workshop a verb, but time is money!) on Sufjan’s previous tour in the fall of 2009. Other songs on the EP include the 17-minute guitar jam-for-single-mothers "Djohariah," and the gothic piano ballad "The Owl and the Tanager," a live-show mainstay (and Debbie Downer if you ask us; what’s it doing on a "Delighted" EP?). The full track list is available right here.
 
If you don’t have five dollars, you can stream the EP for free right on Bandcamp. Or if you're into tactile sensations, we are making All Delighted People available on single-CD and double-LP formats later in 2010 (we’re aiming for December, fingers crossed). 180-gram vinyl. With Big Pictures. Where’s Waldo? Leo?
 
OH! In case you haven't been reading along, Sufjan is also on tour in the fall. Tickets are selling furiously, so we recommend you order them soon, as in now! Seriously! Do it! Urgency! Haste! Right here!

SUFJAN STEVENS TO TOUR

August 9th, 2010 , by


Photo by Denny Renshaw

Sufjan is going on tour in October! This should be quite a tour, as he personally structured this tour around some of the most historic theaters and venues in the country. He'll start on October 12th in Montreal and move his way through the Midwest, to Texas, westerly, and then back through the Midwest and to New York. 
 
Tomorrow, Tuesday August 10th, we begin selling special pre-sale tickets especially for fans. We negotiated the fairest price we could for tickets and Where we could, we also secured exclusive seating in each of the venues.
 
We expect these to sell out very quickly, and there are only a select number of pre-sale seats available. But do not fret; if for some reason you miss out on the pre-sale through Etix, you will have the opportunity to purchase the remaining tickets through the venues. Sales for some theaters will begin on Friday, August 13th, while others will start later. Please check with your local venue for their public on-sale date. To avoid scalping, there is a 4 person ticket limit, and the first 20 rows of seats are WILL CALL ONLY.
 
There are only a select number of pre-sale seats available at each venue. Tickets for these seats go on sale starting tomorrow, Tuesday August 10th, at 1pm EST. You can see details, dates, and (as of Tuesday 1pm EST) links to purchase tickets here:
 
Again, if you miss the pre-sale tickets don't worry. These are large venues, and after the presale you'll be able to pick up general admission tickets.
 
And lots of other Asthmatic Kitty artists are touring as well, passing through your city no doubt, including Castanets, Chris Schlarb, DM Stith, Fol Chen, Jookabox, Rafter, and Shannon Stephens. See those dates here. 

WATCH THE BQE ON PITCHFORK.TV

March 30th, 2010 , by

Last year, we released Sufjan Stevens' The BQE, a cinematic suite inspired by the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway (and the Hula-hoop) and released by us two years after its initial performance. 

In what is yet another way to experience the project (you know, beside the t-shirts), you can now watch the whole thing only on Pitchfork.tv until the end of the week. You can also purchase the project in its myriad forms here.

BEN + VESPER RELEASE SUFJAN-PRODUCED EP

February 10th, 2010 , by

With LuvInIdleness, Sufjan Stevens has continued exploring his marital fetish and recorded another husband and wife duo (cf. The Welcome Wagon). The record is a lush pop EP from his old friends Ben + Vesper, the hard-scrabble, working-class artist parents from West Orange, New Jersey. Inspired by both Xanadu and A Midsummer Night's Dream, Luvinidleness is a healthy bonanza of five songs that render the woes of ordinary life (work, rent, mouths to feed! oh the mouths!) into glorious (and psychedelic) orchestrations of bubalicious pop. Sufjan described the recording process as  "high-velocity, instant chemistry, rowdy fun, tag-team multi-tracking, vocal genuflecting, drum-fill whimsy, space-station bass synth, and vocal harmony madness." B+V calls it one of the "funnest" [sic] recordings they've ever done, and that it involved peanut butter cookies. They recommend a subwoofer for best listening experience.

You can download a very good and very free MP3 from the album by clicking here. To buy the CD for $9, click here to journey across the web to Sounds Familyre, or here to buy it from iTunes for about $5. We recommend you do so – they'll be touring with Danielson shortly, and how are you going to sing along if you don't know the words?
 
B-O-N-U-S! Stereogum has a new video from B+V here!

SHARE A VERY SUFJAN XMAS!

November 24th, 2009 , by

Photo by Denny Renshaw

We’re not the kind to usually leapfrog to Christmas goose before we’ve turked our turkey. Still, what with shipping time, Friday being the first Christmas music day of the year, etc et al, we thought we’d let you know a few things about Sufjan Stevens’ wonderful Songs for Christmas.

We’ve dusted off our Christmas site for the season. It’s at xmas.asthmatickitty.com.There, you can stream the entire 5-CD boxset for free until Christmas day, play a videogame designed by up and coming animation superstar Tom DesLongchamp, download ringtones (now for iPhone!), watch videos, and download ornaments. The site is just like last year’s, but now with more tradition!

And we know some of you are thinking of giving Sufjan’s Songs for Christmas boxset to friends. We’d like to help! For the next few weeks you can buy one for just $15 (it’s normally $19), two for $25, or 3 for $30 (each additional boxset is just $10) – plus shipping & handling. Simply add the boxset to your cart by clicking here, change to appropriate quantity level, and away you go, merrily enjoying Christmas!

SUFJAN STEVENS TO INTRODUCE SELECT SCREENINGS OF THE BQE

October 28th, 2009 , by

Photo by Denny Renshaw
If you didn’t already know, The BQE cinematic suite by Sufjan Stevens is out now. You can buy it here in myriad ways. Of course, we here at AK have been feverishly listening to and watching it non-stop, like vigilant commuters on the BQE. And just like the actual Brooklyn-Queens Expressway, there’s a whole lot of stuff to this project: a comic book, a film, a soundtrack, hula-hoops (which our First Lady apparently loves), a 3-D Viewmaster reel, etc, etc, et al, etc. We just might as well add some t-shirts to the mix. (Actually, that’s not a bad idea.) It’s dizzying, as in just-being-whalloped-by-a-Hooper-Hero-dizzying.
What to do?
Well, you could go to any number of American cities in the next few days and hear Sufjan introduce the film in person. He will not be playing any music (Osso and DM Stith make fine work of that), but he will be appearing in five select cities to introduce the film. This will occur in Minneapolis on October 29th, then in Madison on the 30th, Indianapolis on November 1st, and Cincinnati on November 3rd. He may also make it to Louisville on November 2nd. If you’re looking for details, you’ll find them on Osso’s tour dates right here.

SEE MORE OF SUFJAN STEVENS BQE AND RUN RABBIT RUN

October 25th, 2009 , by

Run Rabbit Run and The BQE are hardly solitary affairs, and an art show that opened Saturday at 92YTribeca in New York City will acknowledge as much. Run Rabbit Run, which is a take on Sufjan Stevens‘ 2001 Enjoy Your Rabbit by string quartet Osso, employed the artwork of Jessica Dessner. Dessner’s original pencil drawings that adorn the Run Rabbit Run album will be on display. So too will the urban landscape photographs of Denny Renshaw that Sufjan included in the BQE CD and LP inserts. And you may have seen the projection work of Deborah Johnson at one of Sufjan’s shows (or you can watch it on Vimeo here). Her star drawings will find a temporary home on the walls of 92YTribeca for the duration of the show. 
The show is free. You can get more details on 92YTribeca’s website right here.

THE BQE AND ITS MYRIAD FORM

October 20th, 2009 , by

Sufjan Stevens The BQE is out today. Suffice it to say, the number of product options is multiplicious. To catalog them all in one place, we made a nice handy summary right here. This page lists purchase options for digital video, including the only way to get the film in QuickTime HD and iPhone/iTunes playable. Read more about The BQE right here.

#WTDTW (WHAT TO DO THIS WEEKEND)

September 11th, 2009 , by

Via our Twitter account (please, do follow us!): Fri: @HeladoNegro @ Bottletree #Birmingham Sat: Sujfan Stevens @ATPfestival – #NYC, HeladoNegro @ William’s House #Nashville, Fol Chen @ Proud Galleries #London, Sun: Rafter @ Casbah #SanDiego, Helado Negro at Bobo @Asheville. What a full weekend!

Details are here. A special note: playing through entire albums is often the custom at ATP, and so on Saturday Sufjan will do just that with Seven Swans.

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