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Illinoise
Illinois sounds like The Sea and Cake collaborating with the high-school band from a Wes Anderson film on banjo-driven, pulsing meditations on Vince Guaraldi's music for Peanuts. Sufjan Stevens, the singer-songwriter behind the endeavor, is an earnest and whimsical young man who aims to record an album based on every state in the union, though this is just his second attempt since 2003's Michigan. Lavish praise has been heaped upon this precocious twenty-something, who weaves personal recollections, historical narratives, and strange facts together to create lush portraits of Midwestern life. It's not maudlin stuff, and the atypical instrumentation (strings, choirs, trumpets, vibes) is beyond gimmick. Halfway through "John Wayne Gacy, Jr.," when Stevens has you feeling true empathy for a serial killer, it's clear that he really is an artist of the highest order. These are weird and lovely middlebrow ditties; we eagerly await the Broadway adaptation. --Mike McGonigal
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Tracks| 1 | Concerning the UFO Sighting Near Highland, Illinois | | 2 | Black Hawk War, Or, How to Demolish an Entire Civilization and ... | | 3 | Come on! Feel the Illinoise!: Pt. 1: The World's Columbian Exposition | | 4 | John Wayne Gacy, Jr. | | 5 | Jacksonville | | 6 | Short Reprise for Mary Todd, Who Went Insane, But for Very Good ... | | 7 | Decatur, Or, Round of Applause for Your Stepmother! | | 8 | One Last "Whoo-Hoo!" for the Pullman | | 9 | Chicago | | 10 | Casimir Pulaski Day | | 11 | To the Workers of the Rock River Valley Region, I Have an Idea ... | | 12 | Man of Metropolis Steals Our Hearts | | 13 | Prairie Fire That Wanders About | | 14 | Conjunction of Drones Simulating the Way in Which Sufjan Stevens ... | | 15 | Predatory Wasp of the Palisades Is out to Get Us! | | 16 | They Are Night Zombies!! They Are Neighbors!! They Have Come Back from | | 17 | Let's Hear That String Part Again, Because I Don't Think They Heard It | | 18 | In This Temple as in the Hearts of Man for Whom He Saved the Earth | | 19 | Seer's Tower | | 20 | Tallest Man, The Broadest Shoulders: Pt. 1: The Great Frontier/Pt. ... | | 21 | Riffs and Variations on a Single Note for Jelly Roll, Earl Hines, ... | | 22 | Out of Egypt, Into the Great Laugh of Mankind, And I Shake the ... |
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