Sufjan Stevens: "My personal problems have become universal"

We've gotten used to expecting great things from Sufjan Stevens, that New York-based Detroit kid, as well versed in modern classical music and

as he is in American folk and fusion, who became famous in the early 2000s with an ambitious attempt to release an album related to each of the states of the United States.

The musician edited two:

, a tragicomic ode to the dignity and desolation of his home state, and

, a chamber folk epic about anything between superheroes and serial killers.

To create

(2015), an album in which he performed an emotional exorcism, delving into tender and painful detail in his relationship with a distant mother and an understanding stepfather, Stevens delved into himself.

Now, with

, he has produced an

80-minute electronic

about old worlds dying, new worlds being born, God, humanity, and the very nature of life.

Great is the least that can be said of this work.

"Due to my spiritual practice, it is customary for me to devote effort to reflecting on the faith," explains Stevens - whose unusual first name comes from his parents' brief involvement in the multi-denominational

movement

- on the source of inspiration for

.

"I have been singing about these issues for 20 years: what makes everything stick together? Is there a higher power? Do we have a spiritual map that gives content and meaning to our lives? The difference is that, now, this kind of Questions have become universal. We are losing faith in society, government, leadership, basic social institutions, ourselves. My problems are no longer personal. My problems are universal. "

"The album is a reminder that we cannot continue as if nothing happened. We have to die and be born again."

Stevens wrote the album's theme song, an avant-garde 20 and a half minute composition dedicated to the state of their country and titled 'America', during the same sessions that

.

As it seemed to her that it did not fit with what she was doing at the time, she put it in a drawer.

"After a few years, I met her by chance and then she seemed prophetic to me, true to what I saw in the world and what I felt," he says of the song.

"From then on I started to write music related to that characteristic in tone and style. I felt the responsibility to remove myself from the conversation."

Still, the interpreter's voice finds a way to get inside.

"I don't want to be your personal Jesus, I don't want to live inside that flame," Stevens sings in the beautiful and obsessive 'Video Game', a critique of the cult of fame, in a voice so slight it sounds as if it could dissolve into it. beat of the drum machine.

"I have lost faith in everything," he laments in 'Tell Me You Love Me'.

In 'Make Me An Offer I Can't Refuse' he prays: "Lord, I need salvation", as if he were a Saint Francis of Assisi in a baseball cap.

Christian themes have emerged throughout the musician's production, particularly in

(2004), his interpretation of biblical stories to the banjo, but never so clearly as now.

"I am a fairly orthodox Christian," he confesses.

"All I'm trying to do is advocate for self-denial and self-awareness, to encourage people to live with a hunger for truth and transformation. The album is a reminder to the world that we can't go on like nothing is wrong, so maybe We need to question our way of life. We need to assume nothing, expect nothing, eradicate our old consciousness and move in the direction of rebirth. We have to die and be reborn. "

Stevens' search for meaning dates back to his childhood.

is inspired in part by the teachings of Rudolf Steiner, the Austrian founder of anthroposophy, a philosophical line whose goal is to direct spiritual practice towards scientific rationality.

Anthroposophy is the foundation of education in the Steiner and Waldorf schools.

Stevens was a student of one of the latter in Detroit until he was nine years old.

"Steiner wanted spiritual emancipation to free us from human authority, something that has been very important to me in recent times. I want to take full responsibility for myself and not be subordinate to the external authorities of the world: the institutions, the great companies, governments, even religions that impose a reality on us. I wanted to rebuild what I feel and what I want as an individual. This album is a detox diet for the conscience. "

"I wanted to rebuild what I feel and what I want as an individual. This album is a detox diet for the conscience"

Stevens is best known for his whispering and intimate folk-style renditions of the American songbook, but a glance at his extensive catalog suggests that he is an artist in perpetual search for something new.

electronic abstraction

was a product of circumstance: Running out of his Brooklyn studio when the landlord raised the rent, he had to put his instruments away in a storage room while he moved upstate, so all he had to work for it was a laptop, a Prophet synthesizer, and a drum machine.

"Dedicating yourself to music is sublime because the road is full of setbacks and surprises," explains Stevens about his way of taking things.

"That is why I refuse to take full responsibility for my creations. I do not do it out of devotion. Denying my work is useful to my ego. I know that it seems that I work by themes, but the most important thing is the moments of magic and mystery that they force an unconscious reaction. "

Still, making an album about every state in America requires a good deal of planning and a lot of ego as well.

"That was more than 15 years ago. I had a lot more ego than now, and if I'm honest, the idea of ​​the 50 states was an act of self-promotion," he confesses.

"Then after

, I realized it was useless. I'm not saying I'm not going to ever do it ... but maybe America isn't such a healthy subject anymore."

Still, Stevens remains an optimistic character whose faith always directs him toward a better future.

be published amidst the chaos of Trump's America and the worst pandemic since 1918. Our lives have been turned upside down.

It's easy to dissolve into apocalyptic thinking, but despite his words about the ecstasy, salvation, and liberation of the beast within in the style of the book of Revelation, its author insists that

is a positive album.

"Humanity has always lived in its own apocalyptic moment, which is the product of self-absorption, of the idea that we are the center of the universe," he reflects.

"It may also have to do with the fear of death: we are mortal by nature and that terrifies us. Maybe thinking that life is cyclical, that nature runs its course taking care of its own affairs, gives us a more accurate perspective" .

"The hangovers were getting too intense and the sibling crowd was getting in the way of my well-being. I've given New York 20 years. It was time to move on."

By moving to the mountains in upstate New York earlier this year after 20 years in the city, Stevens has become more aware that nature carries on.

He has made trips to the hardware store and the tractor store, has spoken with the neighbors about the seed catalogs and the abundant harvests and, in general, has disengaged from the habits of a life in the city in which, he says, " the hangovers were getting too intense and the human crowd was getting in the way of my well-being. People here are made of a different kind of stuff, and I like it. I've given New York 20 years. It was time to move on to something else. "

In Stevens's words,

was "a beastly job."

Every day he would get up, dedicate all the hours that were necessary, and for each song finally recorded, at least five unsuccessful attempts have remained on the hard disk.

Despite the ambition he has put into the album and his hope that it will inspire a shift in consciousness and a desire for personal transformation, the work is also grounded in a more concrete reality: "The album is a reflection of the departure of The city. It talks about leaving civilization, moving to a healthy place and being surrounded by nature. "

Our interlocutor reflects on what he has just explained: "It's a stereotype, right?"

Translation of News Clips.

The Ascension.

Sufjan Stevens.

Ashmatic Kitty.