E.A.R. #2: The Age of Adz

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I'm not hip, gang.

I don't own a pair of neon green Ray-Bans. I don't sip Pabst Blue Ribbon. I don't have a single ironic tattoo of ALF, or the Flipper logo.

All I've got is perspicacity. And man-tits.

Let's talk about Sufjan Stevens!

Oh, for fuck's sake. Now I don't even want to do this.

What was my point? Right. The Age of Adz.

Released in 2010 on Asthmatic Kitty Records, Adz is indie sweetheart Sufjan (Soof-yan) Stevens' weird transition to electronic pop rock. Best known for 2005's highly listenable Illinois (and the aborted Fifty States Project -- one album based on each US state -- from which it originated), Stevens had been on a decidedly folky, vaguely Christian trajectory for the majority of his celebrated career.

The album opener: "Futile Devices", a tender, stripped-down ballad sung in near-whisper, serves as the bridge between Illinois-era Stevens and his bizarre metamorphosis into a Jesus-y Peter Gabriel, which is immediately evidenced on the record's second cut, "Too Much". The track begins with gurgling electronics that struggle to birth a neck-cracking industrial drum track and, perhaps most unlikely, drive-by synth-stabs.

Like light cycles. From Tron.

Soon, the song opens up into fashionably retro, unfashionably romantic "adult rock" territory -- a sound that could've easily boombox-assaulted Ione Skye's bedroom window circa '89.

But, for all my rude 'tude and obvious distrust of Sufjan Stevens -- who reminds me of a pious teenaged pothead on an Emmaus retreat who will totally try to fuck your kid sister after the chill "Kumbaya" jam and share session -- I have to admit that "Too Much" is pretty gorgeous. The bombastic string-drenched bridge nearly made me drive off the road on first listen.

You know, in the good way.

That's pretty much par-for-the course on The Age of Adz. Beauty in spades. I mean, I can't pretend that I'm 100% comfortable with a track like "Get Real Get Right" with its "You know you really gotta get right with the Lord" admonitions. Though, what kind of double-standard flaunting dickhead would I be to deny Stevens his religious passion... when I unabashedly relish the R&B/soul greats of the 1970s? Those artists were far, FAR more psyched about God than Stevens is on his sunniest Sunday.

Have you heard What's Going On? Apparently Jesus is what's going on.

The Age of Adz isn't "church rock". And it isn't fucking Stryper. This is an earnest, cohesive statement coming from whatever happy-place Sufjan Stevens needs to visit in order to get through the day. It's hard to fault him for that when the result is a disarmingly positive, post-ironic, and theoretically danceable collection of superlative pop music.

Right on.


Check it out.