The Sigla Blog

Sufjan Stevens
Come on Feel The Illnoise *****

Albums, unless they’re compilations or anthologies (see this month’s Luke Haines review), generally come along, nicely packaged with an average of 12-15 tracks. Sufjan Steven’s ‘Come on Feel The Illnoise’ has no truck with such pithiness. His latest album boasts 22 songs and is the second instalment in an ambitious geography-meets-music project. In 2003, he released ‘Greetings From Michigan: The Great Lakes State’, the first album about each of the 50 US states.
With that context in mind, ‘Come on Feel the Illnoise’ is as sprawling and diverse as you’d expect. It’s as much an ideological overview of America as it is a joyful plunder of everything from campfire folk to alt country ballads. It has its quiet moments in abundance ‘The Predatory Wasp of The Palisades Is Out To Get Us’, ‘John Wayne Gacy, Jr.’ but it boasts uplifting epics too, as on the perfect, ‘Chicago’ and the Frontier foot stamp of the title track.
Stevens is a chronicler of old school landscapes and modern Americana and is a gifted and challenging composer. Not only is the album lengthy (and that’s not just the song titles), the list of instruments he’s responsible for on her make an impressive bric-a-brac. At some point or other, he plays acoustic guitar, piano, Wurlitzer, electric bass, drums, electric guitar, oboe, saxophone, flute, banjo, glockenspiel, accordion, vibraphone, recorders, a Casiotone MT-70, sleigh bells, shakers, tambourine, triangle and a Baldwin electric church organ. Multi-layered harmonies and choral arrangements could also be added to this, and brings to mind Jimi Tenor’s excellent ‘Beyond The Stars’ album.

The mood can shift from downbeat to clap-happy like the sun disappearing behind a cloud, and its this unpredictable uniqueness that make this so good. ‘Come on Feel the Illnoise’ is a stunning opus; a musical map of long open roads and the ultimate soundtrack to road trips and endless possibilities. Bring on the other 48 albums…

Info: www.sufjan.com