The Daily Spin, May 29
Sufjan Stevens | Reflections
Welcome back to the Daily Spin, the series in which I review 365 albums during 2023.
Each album will be given a rating on a scale from 0 to 10. You can look at the entire set here. Additionally, you can check out a list of my favorite song from each album right here.
If you want to suggest an album, good news! You can do so right here!
Album: Reflections (2023)
Artist: Sufjan Stevens
Link:
Gentle undulations are the central focus of Reflections, an instrumental composition of roughly 30 minutes that spans over seven tracks. It’s pleasant, even if it’s not entirely what I was expecting going into this album blind.
More than anything, it’s beautiful. Stevens has always had a knack for arranging, and paired with collaborators Timo Andres and Conor Hanick, that’s only accentuated, with each stroke of the piano proving time and time again that some people just have the sauce when it comes to things of this nature.
This sort of feels like the type of music you’d hear at the old Von Maur in the Eden Prairie Center off 212, someone dinking around on the piano, though Reflections carries more energy than that album does. At times, that energy jumbles the feeling of the album - despite it being just one instrument, it feels overwhelmingly chaotic to the point of suffocation at points. The album remains strongest when it lets the noise fall away, as has always been the case. The calm before and after the storm is the most enticing sound.
Rating: 8.0/10
Best Tracks: Mnemosyne; Euphoros
Worst Tracks: Revanche