Sufjan Stevens & Angelo De Augustine – A Beginner's Mind | Album Review
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For better or worse, Sufjan Stevens’ lasting mark on pop culture may be his ill-fated 50 States Project. Whether catching random strays on Twitter, receiving post-mortem retrospectives via music blogs, or being spiritually revived by fans, it seems that the idea of each state receiving its own album-length dedication was too alluring of a conceptual hook for some to let go of. And I get it, just extrapolate the data; Illinois is an all-time classic indie album, and Michigan is one of my favorite records of all time. It’s easy to look at those two LPs and go, ‘man, I hope Sufjan writes an ornate 90-minute indie-folk album about my state.’ Maybe that’s why people can’t seem to move on; because it’s so personal, so potential-filled, and so hopelessly abandoned.
Sure, Sufjan has enjoyed a relatively recent pop-cultural hit in “Mystery of Love” (with an Oscar appearance to boot), but as those Tweets and articles above prove, his 50 States PR stunt was an idea that appealed to music fans from all across the country for very obvious reasons. No matter how many hit songs or incredible albums Stevens makes, some music fans will forever be hung up on the 50-album pitch that he first staked his name on.
The thing that bugs me about The 50 States Project being Sufjan’s primary cultural touchstone is because it misses the point of why those albums are great. If you take those releases at face value and simply view them as “records about states,” then Sufjan Stevens has already dipped his toes into similar conceptual waters. He’s written an album about every planet in the solar system, he’s recorded over 100 Christmas songs, he’s made a record about stories from the bible, and even created an entire multi-media project about a specific bridge in Brooklyn. If those don’t show commitment, then I don’t know what does.
Obviously, these conceptual hooks might not have been broad or clever enough to garner that same level of mainstream attention. Sure, I enjoy them, but I am also a Sufjan freak. My point is that Sufjan Stevens has created albums with similar levels of conceptual commitment; it’s just that nothing has managed to break through in quite the same way as the 50 States Project did. That’s why, when Asthmatic Kitty announced A Beginners Mind, my interest was piqued.
Unveiled as a collaborative project between Sufjan Stevens and labelmate Angelo De Augustine, A Beginner’s Mind is a concept album where each song is “(loosely) based off popular movies.” The album promised to run the filmic gamut from highbrow films to lowbrow popcorn flicks and everything in between. That sounds like some damn broad appeal there.
The other half of this equation is the music itself. As mentioned above, both Michigan and Illinois are best-in-class indie records. As much as it pains me to admit, only a select few pieces of Sufjan’s oeuvre even get close to broaching the same level of quality, whether they had similarly ambitious concepts or not. Planetarium is fun, Seven Swans is stark, and BQE is charmingly earnest, but those records are far from universally appealing. Similarly, (as much as I adore them), it’s not outlandish to see why 100 Christmas songs wouldn’t appeal to everybody. But movies? Everyone loves movies!
When I clicked play on “Reach Out,” the album’s opening song and first of four singles, I was immediately struck with a sense of “Classic Sufjan,” for lack of a better term. Sure, he was flanked by a collaborator and confidante in Augustine, but it truly sounded folky as fuck, and that’s something I have been missing since 2015’s Carrie & Lowell. It’s not like Sufjan hasn’t been prolific over the last decade or so; in the time since his seventh studio album he’s scored a ballet, released a synth collaboration with his father-in-law, and even dropped a two-and-a-half-hour-long electronic piece earlier this year. Furthermore, 2020 saw the release of The Ascension, Sufjan’s first proper studio album in nearly five years, and while that record was good, it was more an extension of his electronic-tinged Age of Adz from a decade prior. What I’m saying is that those releases all felt like auxiliary additions and electronic diversions within the Sufjan Stevens Canon. It’s been over half a decade since we’ve heard anything like this from an artist whose greatest works are all firmly rooted in the trappings of folk music.
Luckily that single wasn’t just a bait-and-switch; the album continues this folky trend while still edging into exciting new sonic territories. Both “Lady Macbeth In Chains” and “Back To Oz” are groovy early-album cuts that evoke visions of peak Fleetwood Mac or “Young Man’s Game” off of the most recent Fleet Foxes album. There are aching piano-led ballads, precise guitar plucks, and songs grounded by searching ambient swirls.
Lyrically, the device of using these famous films as jumping-off points allows for our singers to shift perspective at will, much like Sufjan did on those early States albums. Just as Michigan and Illinois would see Stevens placing himself in the shoes of a down-on-his-luck Yooper or a renowned serial killer, the songs on A Beginner’s Mind see our intrepid duo taking unique perspectives on stories that have already proven themselves to be compelling. Sometimes our musical guides sing from the point of view of a character directly from the film; other times, they analyze the cinematic events of a given movie from an omnipotent distance.
In almost every case, as a listener, it’s fascinating to put the pieces together and see how Stevens and Augustine use these ideas from a completely different medium as artistic inspiration. Regardless of the source film or your familiarity with it, these songs are written in a way that makes you relate to their plight either by linking it to something universal or through sheer force of empathy. For example, in “You Give Death A Bad Name,” the duo use Night of the Living Dead as a way to discuss climate change, the failings of a capitalistic society, and general disillusionment with America. These are all topics that Sufjan thoroughly delved into nearly two decades ago within the States Projects and as recently as songs like “America” off The Ascension from last year. They’re ongoing evolutions of thoughts on the same subjects, just cast in a different light.
Elsewhere on the album, the two touch on themes of religion, death, and general existential dread, all tried-and-true topics for both artists. Sometimes they work the title of the movie into the chorus of a song like the aforementioned “Back to Oz” or “It’s Your Own Body And Mind,” where they delicately croon “she’s gotta have it” over a series of gentle acoustic guitar strums.
“Olympus,” another early single, uses Clash of the Titans as inspiration to paint a scene not of mythical claymation monsters but genuine human connection. The song’s outro deploys a poetic lyrical alternation to hone in on hyper-specific details that quickly work their way up to cosmic forms of adoration.
There’s something
And it’s the light on your hand
There’s something
And it’s the touch of my wristband
There’s one thing
And it’s the weight of our wish
There’s one thing
And it’s our very first kiss
Songs also contain quotable one-off barbs that all land at different times, depending on how close you listen. Minutes before the above quote in the same Clash of the Titans-themed song, Sufjan asks himself, “am I at rest, or resigned in my chaos?” Quite a deep and existential line for a song based on a 40-year-old fantasy adventure movie.
Outside of the music and lyrics, these songs are all wrapped in gorgeous art courtesy of Daniel Anum Jasper as seen throughout this article. Jasper is a Ghanaian artist famous for his work in the 80s in “mobile cinema” culture. This phenomenon first emerged when enterprising film fans screened Hollywood blockbusters in the backs of pick-up trucks using portable generators. Ghanaian artists painted alternate posters to advertise the movies, inspired only by the scant information they had about each film. Within Asthmatic Kitty’s press release, the label explains this choice with poignant and concise rationale:
By transforming old films into vital new songs with new imagery, Stevens and De Augustine ask us to consider ourselves (and the world around us) from a previously unconsidered vantage point—a new way of seeing and hearing—an exercise that’s as necessary and relevant now as it’s ever been.
And therein lies the true appeal of Sufjan’s most remarkable work, whether it’s weaving tales of snow-covered life in the midwest, the bleeps and bloops of an alien planet, the stark emptiness of loss, or the portrayal of Pinhead in Hellraiser III. As listeners, we haven’t always experienced those things firsthand, but that doesn’t make them any less relatable. In fact, when presented in the right way, even the most far-off places and unknowable concepts can feel surprisingly easy to understand.
So, given all these options, why would you ever want an album penned about your hometown? Just to hear familiar nouns rendered in song form? I’d argue it’s more exciting, fulfilling, and rewarding to visit these distant landscapes and imagined perspectives because they are so opposite of our day-to-day life. These songs give us entire worlds to escape into, even if just for a few minutes at a time. It’s an exercise in empathy, but it also ladders up to some greater understanding of the universe. The concepts of grief, love, longing, and loss are practically too big for words, but maybe if you look at them from enough perspectives, you begin to see pieces of the bigger picture.
