sufjan stevens silver and gold essay

Sufjan Stevens is a crazy person. Throughout Silver & Gold, his second multi-volume set of Christmas tunes, we see him diving back into Yuletide minutiae, combing and back-combing the finer tropes of the Western world’s most tired (and treasured) holiday, until it’s a tangled mess. The hope here is that, by the end, he’s unearthed something fresh about the season but has he? Or is it just really long and weird? And why is it so weird anyways? 1. IT’S 5 VOLUMES LONG Sufjan released Songs for Christmas, Vols. 1-5 in 2006, and now he’s back with 5 more volumes of music. Vols. 6-10 do stack up against the first five well, though there’s some re-trodden ground here. At times, it feels like this collection could be 2 or 3 volumes instead of 5. Around Vol. 7, I Am Santa’s Helper, you’ll start to get a little bored, and then it veers into drunken caroler territory (listen to “We Wish You a Merry Christmas” and “Ding-a-ling-a-ring-a-ling”) with an overabundance of gang vocals and half-baked, minute-long songs. As you slog through Vol. 7, you might agree that if Sufjan had published only the original material here, we’d have a better collection of songs. 2. IT’S BY SUFJAN OK, at first glance, this isn’t that weird. Stevens rose to indie fame on the covert mysticism of his initial releases, albums like Seven Swans, that weren’t necessarily about Jesus, but were sprinkled with a lot of God-fearing lyrics & Judeo-Christian leanings. What makes it weird is the direction that Sufjan takes the tone of this collection – at times it feels like he’s celebrating the baby Jesus’ birth. Other times, it’s like he’s channeling the pagan traditions of Christmas. And other times he’s taking on the commercial side of Christmas and what it actually means – Sufjan collocates the new and old of Christmas, honing in on our deformed feelings about family, presents, religion; the hypocrisy, the.
As Sufjan Stevens proves with Silver & Gold, his five-EP sequel to 2006’s Songs for Christmas, there’s a clear distinction between a “holiday album” and a “Christmas album.” Holiday albums are virtually all artifice—gift-wrapped, commercialized bundles of faux-cheer. Christmas albums—or, at least, Christmas albums as performed by Sufjan Stevens—are more intriguing and altogether weirder: exploring the holiday’s extreme contradictions through both Christian and secular lenses. In all its virgin births and snowmen and prayer and corporate greed, Christmas remains a genuine mess. And who better to tackle the world’s most complicated holy day than Sufjan Stevens, a Christian man playing largely secular music built on extreme sonic juxtapositions, ranging from heartbreaking folk meditations to large-scale symphonies to dorky electro-pop? Silver & Gold is much more than just a collection of songs. Its lavish, 80-page booklet is filled with breathless essays (Sufjan’s diatribe on the symbolism of Christmas trees, an apocalyptic and slightly chilling reflection on “Advent & The End Times” by Pastor Thomas Vitp Aituo), and, of course, the collection comes with a foldable star ornament, poster, and creepy temporary tattoos (sample images: a skeleton wielding an axe with the caption “Here’s Santa,” a gangsta snowman armed with a chainsaw, pandas wearing tacky Christmas sweaters, and an odd-looking Jesus bearing the slogan “Blowin’ Your Mind!”). The function of all this intentional tackiness is unclear: A goofy reflection of Christmas’ pimped-out corporate absurdity? A surrealist collage for the sake of surrealist collage? Whatever it is, it’s a typical Sufjan spectacle. And the music, spread across five disparate EPs, is equal parts clusterfuck. Volume 6, 2006’s Gloria, is the most traditional group of songs in the bunch: Recorded and arranged with assistance from The.
December 23, 2012 It has taken me more than a few weeks to work through all fifty-eight tracks of Sufjan Steven’s Silver and Gold. My daughter Rachel is fascinated with Sufjan’s version of “Santa Claus is Coming to Town.” So much so, that she made me play it for her five times in a row yesterday morning. Our household has received a lot of dance milage out of that track. Silver and Gold is comprised of five separate EP’s. Each EP contains its own moments of brilliance, but I keep returning to I Am Santa’s Helper: Volume Seven. Highlights include several stunning Sacred Harp inspired melodies and instrumental vignettes reminiscent of those found on Illinoise. It is a hauntingly beautiful representation of the artistic and theological vision of Silver and Gold. Some of the most poignant moments on I Am Santa’s Helper: Volume Seven happen between tracks nine and fifteen. The irreverent “Ding-A-Ling-A-Ring-A-Ling” and “Mr. Frosty Man” are set beside the choral tranquility of “Ah Holy Jesus” and “How Shall I Fitly Greet Thee.” In context with each other, these tracks offer a snapshot of what Sufjan may be up to in this collection. The stark profanity of tunes like “Ding-A-Ling-A-Ring-A-Ling” and “Mr. Frosty Man” are placed in the midst of sincerity (Hark! The album as an art form is not dead!). Indeed, baby Jesus has been robbed of glory and replaced with consumer mush. Silver and Gold is anything but benign. It is disruptive, sometimes creepy, and drenched with longing. Attentive listening reveals that the progression of these 5 EP’s are important as they unfold. The Christmas that the listener expects remains just out of reach. Instead, we get an elusive (and often unsettling) progression of themes fit for Advent. This is where the radiance lies and the sermon is preached (for those who have the ears to listen). In an accompanying essay to the Silver and Gold box set.