Javelin, the tenth career album from esteemed singer-songwriter Sufjan Stevens, lands with a 48-page booklet of reflections on love and suffering. With, also, sad news, since we learned that Stevens was suffering from a rare autoimmune disease known as Guillain-Barré syndrome. In the first seconds of the album, we hear him take a deep breath; on the maximalist and streetwise Hello Evergreen in the introduction, then everywhere else, Stevens’ voice shows signs of fatigue, he who nevertheless comes back to life thanks to colorful, melodically dynamic art pop songs, after having lost himself in the sounds of modular synths (the ambitious instrumental suite Summons, 2021). Apart from the friends singing along and the few guitar tracks from Bryce Dessner (The National), everything Javelin was composed, played and recorded by Sujfan, in his small home studioaccentuating the confessional impression of these intimate compositions.
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