Hope you're having a good 4th weekend there in Hometown, Heartland, USA. I'm gearing up for a capital 4th here with the standard routine: afternoon BBQ and then fireworks on the mall. Damn, it just brings your hand to your heart and a tear to your eye, don't it?
I'm not sure if I ever gave you a copy of Sufjan Stevens' "The 50 States Song", and I don't think we've ever talked about it, which is kind of odd considering it was my Sufjan t-shirt that started a conversation making us realize that our tastes in music were more similar than we thought. We should have gone over the guy's entire catalog by now.
This is easily one of my favorite Sufjan songs. The arrangement is simpler than so many of his others, but it has that Sufjan innocence, the beauty and the sort of un-ironic patriotism that I love in his music. When he played it here in DC, where everyone's from somewhere else, everyone in the crowd cheered for their hometown state. My friend Susan and I waited carefully for North Carolina and let out a little whoop.
Not too surprising that the Canadian audience on this recording is completely silent. Which I guess works out well for us listening to the recording of it.
Sufjan Stevens, "The 50 States Song (live)"
(mp3 removed)
This song gives me chills. The bare banjo and vocals and ascending melody, one of Sufjan's sweetest moments ("Pack up your bags, snare drum") and when he goes into "America The Beautiful" at the end, it's almost too much to bear. I've had this song on repeat every Fourth of July since 2005, and I can't imagine it'll go anywhere.
Happy Fourth of July. Try not to blow your fingers off with roadside cherry bombs, huh?
1 comments:
Thanks for this. When I saw him on the Illinois tour in Cinci the whole place exploded during that beautiful pause..."Take a drive to Ohio..."
I feel like this should be labeled 'Nostalgia' as well.
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