Customer Reviews

All Delighted People EP

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I like Sufjan a lot. His lyrics have such a wonderful way of drawing me into intimate stories before yanking me back out to take a look at my own life, America, God, and much more. His music, as he describes it, is often the perfect combination of high art and low art, merging the warmth of folk music with the grandiose of a symphony orchestra. When these elements are at full effect as they are throughout much of Illinois, Michigan, and Seven Swans, he hits me like few others can.

Then there are moments where his ambitions seem to run off and leave me in the cold emotionally. Long, flute-heavy instrumentals, while still technically impressive, never connect for me the same way he does in simpler moments like his astounding Casimir Pulaski Day.

As you might expect, this EP (which only maybe qualifies as such based on its hour-long run time) leans a little more toward the latter style. The title tracks are a suitably epic ode to the apocalypse, which I can't claim to have fully absorbed yet. The Owl and the Tanager is a gorgeous piano-driven song, and the closing track a 17 minute guitar song for single mothers. The point is, this is some eccentric and wildly creative stuff. Fortunately for fans, it's also really really good once you take the time to get into it.

I'd also highly recommend streaming it off his site at [...] before buying it. Enjoy!

To call "All Delighted People" an e.p. is a bit of a misnomer. Since the music clocks in at over 60 minutes - much longer than many "full length" recordings (l.p.'s?) - it must simply refer to the relatively few number of tracks (by Sufjan's standards). Many of us probably expected Sufjan to spend the rest of his life finishing his promising "50 States" project. It's obvious by now, that aint happenin'. But that is no cause for disappointment. Anyone familiar with Sufjan's music knows that the only thing you can expect from him is for him to defy expectations, anyway. This latest installment is no exception. While it steps back from the edgy, purely instrumental offering of The B.Q.E., it is easy to see the musical ancestry from that recording to this. What strikes me more than anything on "All Delighted People" is Sufjan's obvious vocal development since his last vocal offering. Known for his soft, plaintively beautiful vocals, Sufjan actually sounds like he is straining himself to reach new heights on this recording. Combined with his "everything-including-the-kitchen-sink musical approach, the results are exciting (not always the first adjective that comes to mind in describing his music), pleasing and impressive. Sufjan is always forging new territory creatively, so you can be assured you won't hear anything else quite like this all year.

Sufjan Stevens is one of those few artists who can truly stun you with just how passionate and talented he is. Need an example? Take the shimmering, enchantingly lovely "All Delighted People EP," which is actually longer than many full-length albums -- colorful folk pop, warbly vocals, and a strong religious slant.

"Tomorrow you'll see it through/The clouded out disguises put you in the room," Stevens sings mournfully in "All Delighted People (original)," which drifts between soft, bittersweet folk-rock and an epic song of soaring angelic choirs and sweeping strings.

As if the music wasn't good enough, Stevens sings of overcoming inner fear, doubt and hypocrisy ("I tried my best I tried in vain/Oh! But the world is a mess! Oh! But the world is a mess!"). There's also a brass-soaked "classic-rock" version of the title track, which sounds far more cheerful despite having the same lyrics.

I think my brain would explode if the entire album was like that, so fortunately the next songs are less intense. Instead, Stevens relies on soft piano-led melodies, earthy guitar folk, twinkly soaring little ballads (from the POV of God?), and murky experimental ballads. And it ends with "Djohariah," a seventeen-minute rock epic of squiggling synth, trumpets and melancholy guitar.

"All Delighted People" is an almost perfect example of what Sufjan Stevens can do. Without losing sight of his classic sound (the classic rock "All Delighted People" made me flash back to his first album), Stevens manages to expand his sound to include some new, spellbinding musical journeys. The first song is a trip all on its own!

In fact, there's only one song that didn't blow me away: "The Owl and the Tanager," which isn't bad so much as kind of... musically slow.

His music centers mostly on folk-rock rhythms, with lots of acoustic guitar and piano. But many of the melodies are dressed up with colorful sonic garlands -- plucked harp, violins, flittering/squiggling synth, and blasts of brass. And there are those crystalline vocals that soar up in "All Delighted People (original)" and "From The Mouth of Gabriel," as if he's getting some angelic backing.

Speaking of which, Stevens inserts gentle Christian undercurrents into a few of the songs -- not the "rah rah Jesus is awesome!" type, but haunting explorations of sorrow, fear and humanity. The rest of the EP is about love -- rejected love, shattered love , lost love ("And if it grieves you to stay here, just go... For I have no spell on you, it's all a ghost"), and love for someone who has been betrayed.

The "All Delighted People EP" is not only longer than most full-length albums, but it's a layered, exquisite little collection of songs that deserves repeated listens. All delighted people, raise your hands.

Plucks the heart strings like none other; yes, Sufjan has evolved, but he hasn't lost anything of his ability to create the most beautiful, emotive music to be found anywhere. "From the mouth of Gabriel" and "The Owl and the Tanager" are ridiculously amazing songs.

For those struggling with multifarious bleeps, electronica and 25 minute mini symphonies which comprise the new and amazing Sufjan Stevens "The Age of Adz" turning the clock back a couple of months might provide some solace. "All delighted people" was released in August 2010 and hit number 27 in the American charts which is remarkable for an EP which is actually a "front" for a full album. It clocks in at well over an hour and was probably intended as some sort of overture before the main opera that is "Adz". Yet as always when it comes to this wunderkid of modern American music from Detroit, Michigan appearances can be deceiving. This is by any standards a lovely piece of music with songs that have more traditional structures and possibly more melody than "Adz" (although not the sheer level of outright originality). In one sense it does have the same sort of feel as the eclecticism of "Avalanches" Stevens's album of outtakes and extras from the Illinois album and like that album there are some tracks which are slightly "wayward", but largely in a good way.

There is certainly no coherent vision to or concept to be found here. The two long versions of the title track present are acoustic and electric versions which together last well over twenty minutes and with a feel that suggest Stevens is developing "prog" leanings and lyrics which play with Simon & Garfunkel's "The Sound of Silence". The last track "Djohariah" (dedicated to his sister) is described by Stevens as essentially "a 17-minute guitar jam-for-single-mothers" which on occasions rages like the return of Frank Zappa with a slightly distorted guitar and a choir singing a constant refrain of the subjects name.

While all these long bookend tracks are fascinating it is "the meat in the sandwich" that should draw your attention. The stellar highlight is "the Owl and the Tanager" (previously called "Barn owl, night killer") which is a heartbreaking Stevens melody combined with the sparest piano/harp and lyrical references to devil birds, death and diamonds in the rage. It's all very enigmatic, strange, child like and glacially beautiful and one of his best songs ever. There are other songs here that can be traced back to earlier work particularly the feast of banjo led melancholy on the wonderful "Seven Swans". Thus, "Arnika", "Heirloom" and the truly brilliant "From the mouth of Gabriel" will have the ring of familiarity to fans of the wintry acoustic songs of Stevens's earlier work. Finally "Enchanting ghost" is a jazzy acoustic lament which could have happily appeared on one of his "Two state" albums.

NME has described "All Delighted people" as painfully celestial balladeering self-indulgence and it is true that in parts its lacks focus and direction (it would be a shock if it was coherent!). Similarly the absence of "Majesty Snowbird" a song he has performed live which redefines the word "epic" is to be regretted. But on considered judgement let us tell the muso's at NME to politely take a hike since "All delighted people" will be welcomed by all Asthmatic Kitty Aficionados as yet another intriguing addition to the canon of the most original musician currently picking up a guitar, playing a piano or plucking a banjo on terra firma.

This is the greatest album that I listened in 2011. It's a preparation for The Age of Adz, that ends with a great piece of musical art: Djoriah.

Not Sufjan's best work, but at the time of purchase I needed some new music from him. Little did I know he would turn around and come out with the masterpiece: Age of Ads. I recommend that album over this. Age of Ads = 5 stars.

I can't believe I just paid $5 for such an awesome EP. That's all I have to say.

Also Djohariah is great.

Not as mellow as past albums and I wish this were another "state" album but still solid. A bit fuller and more produced, should open Sufjan's audience a bit. Worth checking out if you like his past material or are discovering for the first time.

If you know Sufjan Stevens, you already know he's one of the most important artists to come along in decades, so let's skip all of the adulation and cut to the chase.

We're going to have to get used to something about our beloved Sufjan. That is, he's experimenting with a new kind of "minimalism," I suppose, which is for the most part limited on this album to the last track. With that track, SS asks us to patiently sit through SEVENTEEN minutes of mostly the same 4 chords, and mostly the same lyric. Yes, everthing around those 4 chords changes quite consistently, but in the end it's too little pay off for the insane-asylum-inducing repetition. Previously I compared him to Philip Glass, and I suppose "Djoharia" is a case in point. But while I thought I "got" Einstein on the Beach, I'm not sure I "get" Stevens' new direction.

Maybe in 10 years I'll look back at this review, embarrased because the emporer really DID have clothes after all. Time will tell.