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Features Mister Stevens Neighbourhood Sunday, December 30, 2007 On The Eve Of His Australian Debut, Sufjan Stevens Traces His Love Of Musical Narrative Back To Children’s Television.By Martin Jones
  It’s an astute piece of programming on behalf of the Sydney Festival to have booked both Brian Wilson and Sufjan Stevens. (Oh, and Joanna Newsom with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra performing scores written for her by Van Dyke Parks.) Because to me the similarities between Wilson’s orchestral pop and the work of Stevens are glaring – especially if you juxtapose the dynamic, North American-themed vignettes of SMiLE (which Van Dyke Parks orchestrated) and Stevens’ epic Illinois (Come On Feel The Illinoise).
However, it turns out that, though Stevens respects both Wilson and Van Dyke Parks immensely, he regards neither as a significant influence, the later work of The Beatles remaining his great muse.
On the telephone to talk about his first ever Australian tour, the New York wunderkind is as eloquent, intelligent and opinionated as you would hope him to be. Though his almost deprecating humility is something a little unexpected. Seven albums in as many years represent only a portion of Stevens’ frenetic musical output, man collaborations, film, orchestration, and performance art helping to keep him busy.
But amidst a clamour of obsequious critical praise and indie-kid adoration, it seems that Stevens himself has been the only one not to swallow the hype. In fact, he appears to have become almost tired of himself, taking an extended break from touring following the 2006 release of his Illinois outtakes album, The Avalanche and with no immediate plans for another solo record.
“Yeah that’s true. I didn’t tour at all this whole year,” Stevens confirms that his forthcoming Australian shows will be the first to break that hiatus. “And actually I think it’s perfect to start touring again in Australia because I think it will be rejuvenating. It’s so foreign, and it’s so unusual. And it’ll be warm.”
There are a lot of Australians quite desperate to see you live for the first time, can the raw enthusiasm of a crowd like that be infectious?
Um, yeah I find that I’m affected by my company, obviously. And it can be really rejuvenating and encouraging to be around an excited group of people. I find the show is much different in Germany, for instance, than it is in Ireland. The Irish are very aggressive and they love to chant football songs at your show, and the Germans hardly clap. And when they do, it’s all in unison. They clap in unison. I mean it’s a particular kind of enthusiasm; it just has its own unique flavour.
Well you’ve said you’re not all that interested in touring the Avalanche material, so what will we be hearing?
Well I never really tour in support of an album per se, usually when I’m touring I’m just sort of picking and choosing different songs from all different albums. And I have so many albums of and so many songs and I’m not capable of playing nearly half of them. So for me it’s always a real challenge to choose songs for a set-list. A set is only… you know at the most a generous set is two hours long. Illinois and Avalanche together aren’t over two hours long so I don’t know, I think I’m just going to play a lot of different stuff from all over the place.
Are you limited in who and what you can bring to Australia? We’ve been promised a full rock band, a wind and brass ensemble and video projections.
Yeah, I’m gonna do that. Basically I’m bringing to Australia what I had all through Europe last year. And I think there were ten of us on stage, so we have enough resources to play a lot of the more heavily orchestrated songs. So we’re gonna try to do the most dynamic set that I can muster. And these are people who I’ve been playing with for like a year and half, so we’re pretty comfortable. I think over the past two years I’ve learned a lot playing live, I’m starting to feel a lot more comfortable performing than I have.
At the Sydney Festival, a number of artists, like Brian Wilson and Low, are playing an entire album. Is that something you’ve ever considered?
I would love to try to play Illinois all the way through. I could probably almost do it, but I think it would get boring actually (laughs). It’s so long too, it’s such a long album, I think people would get tired. You’d have to break for a meal in the middle.
Well speaking of Brian Wilson, Illinois in particular always reminded me of SMiLE in many ways – its snapshot of America concept, the classical orchestration, and the musical scope.
Really? Yeah I can see that. I don’t think I’m directly influenced by Brian Wilson or the Beach Boys. Growing up I always preferred The Beatles over the Beach Boys because The Beatles’ songs seemed darker and more mysterious. But as I get older I have a greater affection for Brian Wilson…
The Avalanche is available on Spunk through EMI. Sufjan Stevens plays the State Theatre on January 12, 13 and 14 as part of the Sydney Festival. He also plays the Tivoli in Brisbane on January 10 and the Forum in Melbourne on January 16.
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