Though Stevens had announced plans to make an album for each of the 50 U.S. states, beginning the series with the albums 'Michigan' (2003) and 'Illinois' (2005), he has since then somewhat retracted the statement. "Sufjan Stevens is not going to write a record for each of the 50 states after all" was the original text included on the online liner notes for 'Mews Too: An Asthmatic Kitty Compilation' , a disc released on February 7, 2006. This statement was possibly included as a joke, as the text has since been removed and the current liner notes related to Sufjan Stevens reads: "Sufjan Stevens can fold a fitted-sheet (he once worked as a professional folder in a commercial Laundromat)."
Background
Stevens was born in Detroit, Michigan, and grew up in the city of Petoskey in that same state. He attended Hope College on the west coast of Michigan.
The name Sufjan is an Arabic/Persian name that predates Islam and most famously belonged to Abu Sufyan, a figure from early Islamic history. It has been mentioned in the press that the name was given to Stevens by the leader of Subud, a spiritual sect to which his parents belonged when he was born. Stevens has stated that the name is of Armenian origin and means "comes with a sword," and that it is "a charming militaristic Muslim name." In fact the name is not Armenian, and Armenia is a predominantly Christian country.
Sufjan is also the plural form of Sufi in Persian . Sufi is a practitioner of Sufism .This word is frequently used in the old Persian literature ,specially Sufi poetry .
His brother, marathonist Marzuki Stevens, has trained to compete in the 2008 Olympic trials, and has played on two of Sufjan's albums.
A multi-instrumentalist, Stevens plays the banjo, guitar, drums, and several other instruments, often playing all of these on his albums through the use of multi-tracking. While in school, he studied the oboe and English horn, which he also plays on his albums; he is one of the few musicians in popular music to use these instruments.
Career
Sufjan Stevens began his musical career as a member of Marzuki, a folk-rock band from Holland, Michigan. He also played (and continues to play) various instruments for Danielson Famile. While in school at Hope College, Stevens wrote and recorded his debut solo album, A Sun Came, which he released on Asthmatic Kitty Records, a record label he founded with his step-father in 1999. He later moved to New York City, where he was enrolled in a writing program at the New School for Social Research.
While in New York, Stevens composed and recorded the music for his second album, Enjoy Your Rabbit, a song cycle based around the animals of the Chinese Zodiac that ventured into electronica.
Stevens followed this with the first of his 50 states albums, a collection of folk songs and instrumentals inspired by his home state of Michigan. The result, the expansive Michigan, included odes to cities including Detroit and Flint, the Upper Peninsula, and vacation areas such as Tahquamenon Falls. Melded into the scenic descriptions and characters are his own declarations of faith in God, sorrow, love and the regeneration of Michigan.
Following the release of Michigan, Stevens compiled a collection of songs recorded previously into a side project, the Christian folk album Seven Swans, which was released in March 2004.
Next he released the second in the 50 states projects, entitled Come On Feel The Illinoise!. Among the subjects explored on Come On Feel The Illinoise! are the cities of Chicago, Decatur and Jacksonville, the serial killer John Wayne Gacy, the poet Carl Sandburg, and Mississippi Palisades State Park.
He has contributed to the music of Denison Witmer, Soul Junk, Half-handed Cloud, Brother Danielson, Danielson Famile, Serena Maneesh, Castanets, and Liz Janes. He played piano on for fellow Brooklyn musician's The National's album 2007 Boxer. A cover of "She Is" is included on the album Dream Brother, released in the United States on January 31, 2006.
Sufjan contributed a lot to the sound of the 2001 Liz Janes album Done Gone Fire as he engineered, recorded, produced and arranged it as well as playing many addition instruments.
Sufjan recently recorded with Rosie Thomas and Denison Witmer playing banjo and providing vocals. It is unknown how this record will be released. In April 2006, Pitchfork erroneously announced that Stevens and Thomas were having a baby together, but were forced to print a retraction. Witmer and Thomas later admitted it was an April Fools' prank.
The Fifty States Project
Beginning with Michigan, Stevens announced an intent to write an album for each of the 50 U.S. states, although in interviews he wavers between utter sincerity and self-deprecating irony when describing the idea.
Stevens spent the second half of 2004 researching and writing material for the second of these projects, this time focusing his efforts on Illinois. As with Michigan, Stevens used the state of Illinois as a leaping-off point for his more personal explorations of faith, family, love, and location.
The widely acclaimed Illinois was the highest rated album of 2005 on the Metacritic review aggregator site, based on glowing reviews from Pitchfork, The Onion A/V Club, Spin, Billboard, Entertainment Weekly, Rolling Stone, The New York Times, and The Guardian. The 2006 PLUG Independent Music Awards awarded Stevens with the Album Of The Year, Best Album Art/Packaging, and Male Artist Of The Year. Pitchfork Media and Paste Magazine named Come On Feel The Illinoise! as the editors' choice for best album of 2005 and Stevens received the 2005 Pantheon prize, awarded to albums selling 500,000 copies or fewer, for Come On Feel The Illinoise!. In April of 2006, Stevens announced that 21 pieces of music he had culled from the Come On Feel The Illinoise! recording sessions would be incorporated into a new album, called The Avalanche. The album was released on July 11, 2006.
While there were other projects rumored to be released following 2005's Illinois, by 2009 and his live album The BQE, he was seemingly finished with the project, calling it "Such a joke", and accepting that the project was too massive and too cliché to ever reach an end.
Religious themes
Many of Stevens' songs have religious and spiritual allusions, but his album Seven Swans has the most direct religious references. Stevens has expressed that he is Christian, but does not overtly advertise this aspect of himself in his music. Stevens has also stated that he does not try to make music "with a message", or music for the sake of preaching. "I don't think music media is the real forum for theological discussions," says Stevens. "I think I've said things and sung about things that probably weren't appropriate for this kind of forum. And I just feel like it's not my work or my place to be making claims and statements, because I often think it's misunderstood."
The songs 'Abraham', 'Seven Swans', 'To Be Alone With You', 'We Won't Need Legs To Stand' and 'The Transfiguration' directly address Christianity on the album Seven Swans. In 'Abraham', Sufjan recounts the Old Testament story in the Book of Genesis when Abraham, ordered by God as a test of faith, leads his son, Isaac, up a mountain and prepares to kill him, as commanded (but before God sends an angel to intervene). The lyrics of 'The Transfiguration' follow the Biblical accounts of Jesus' Transfiguration in Matthew 17:1-8, Mark 9: 1-8, and Luke 9:28-36.
Michigan and Come On Feel The Illinoise! are packed with Christian references and metaphors. Michigan contains "Sleeping Bear, Sault Saint Marie", which implores "Oh Lamb of God! Tell us Your perfect design and give us the rod" ("Lamb of God" being a Biblical name for Jesus Christ). The song "Oh God, Where Are You Now?" asks God to "hold me now", to "save somehow", searching for God in the midst of personal turmoil. "There's no other man who could save the dead," the song states. The album closer, 'Vito's Ordination Song', was apparently originally written for Sufjan's friend Vito Aiuto, and its lyrics allude directly to Psalm 139 ("I always knew you. In your mother's arms, I have called your name", "I've made a crown for you"). The song speaks of "When the bridegroom comes" - the New Testament speaks of Jesus Christ as being the Bridegroom and the Church His Bride, finally being united together at the End of Time.
Come On Feel The Illinoise! features the song 'Chicago' with its refrain of "You came to take us, to recreate us", and 'Decatur' has the chorus of "It's the great I Am" ("I Am" being the name the Lord reveals Himself by to Moses in Exodus 3:14). "Casimir Pulaski Day" speaks of "All the glory that the Lord has made" in the midst of personal pain and loss. "The Predatory Wasp of the Palisades Is Out To Get Us!" has the lyrics: "Lamb of God, we sound the horn. Hallelujah!" One instrumental passage has the title of "In This Temple as in the Hearts of Man for Whom He Saved the Earth". "The Seer's Tower" speaks of Emanuel, "With His sword, with His robe He comes dividing man from brothers" (an interesting side note is that "Sufjan" actually means "comes with a sword"). Indeed, the vast majority of songs of Come On Feel The Illinoise! contain lyric lines which can be readily identified as having a basis in Stevens' faith in Christ.
Sufjan's second, electronic album, Enjoy Your Rabbit, contains a song cycle based on of the animals of the Chinese Zodiac, culminating with the song "Year of our Lord". Stevens released the original, Christian-themed song "God'll Ne'er Let You Down" on the "To Spirit Back the Mews" compilation on Asthmatic Kitty. The officially unreleased Christmas albums Sufjan Stevens made and then compiled into Songs for Christmas feature suitably Christmas and Christian themed music, both originals and covers of hymns and traditional songs.
Trivia
On Snow Patrol's 2006 album Eyes Open there is a reference to Sufjan and the song "Chicago" in the song "Hands Open" - "Put Sufjan Stevens on and we'll play your favorite song/"Chicago" bursts to life and your sweet smile remembers you."
Sufjan has twice been featured on the FOX television show "The OC". "To Be Alone With You" and "For The Widows In Paradise, For The Fatherless In Ypsilanti" can be heard on episodes 202 and 315, respectively.
Sufjan Stevens' music has appeared twice on the Showtime dark comedy "Weeds". "All The Trees Of The Field Will Clap Their Hands" appears on S1E02 over the end credits, and "Holland" appears near the end of S2E10.
Two of Sufjan's songs appear on the soundtrack to "Little Miss Sunshine": "Chicago" and "No Man's Land"
The song "John Wayne Gacy, Jr." appears on the 3rd season of the tv show "Nip/Tuck".
Several songs can be heard on the movie "Driving Lessons"
You can also hear snippets in between CSI shows on 5US
In the TV show "Austin City Limits", he mentioned that when he was a kid, he and his best friend saw something in the sky which they couldn't figure out. They thought it was a spaceship or UFO first, then an eagle or a dragon. Finally they realized it was a giant wasp. He wrote the song "The Predatory Wasp of the Palisades is Out to Get Us!" about the incident and mentioned that the reason they (the band) all have wings on stage is to overcome his fear of flying things.
The song "Redford (For Yia-Yia & Pappou)" is heard in the 2012 "World of Red Bull" television commercial. he is quoted as saying "selling out never looked so good." and "somebody had to pay for all of that Christmas confetti." referring to his recent Christmas album and supporting tour.
In 2017 Stevens wrote two Original Songs to be featured in the gay drama film “Call me by your Name”, entitled “Mystery of Love” and “Visions of Gideon”. He also made a reworked version of his Song “Futile Devices” which is also featured on the soundtrack.
Website:http://sufjan.com
Exploding Whale
Sufjan Stevens Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
Loneliness rides in my bed
My misfortune
Give everything you've got
While the sun burns hot
My addiction
Spoils my affection
For everything good
Elephant in the room
Might as well shoot at the moon
The mild ambition
Give everything you've got
Jump the Fosbury flop with intention
Pursue your invention
As something of worth
The thing I most regret
Is having to repress what I'm feeling
While expressing delight as a myth
Embrace the epic fail
Of my exploding whale
Poison or powdered milk (poison or powdered milk)
Paralyzed as it took (paralyzed as it took)
Premonition (what is going on?)
Give everything you've got
Before your life is caught in conditions
Be the first of its victims
The foot of a hare
Action or consequence (action or consequence)
My unyielding defense (my unyielding defense)
Superstition (what is going on?)
My attempts to obscure
The wonders of this world
Be it fortune
Or faith in distortion
The patron of prayer
The thing I most resent
Is having to consent to illusion
While confessing distress with my fist
Will history prevail?
My exploding whale
What of a dream deferred
My appeal in reverse
Apparition
Embrace the epic fail
Of my exploding whale
The lyrics of "Exploding Whale" by Sufjan Stevens delve into themes of loneliness, addiction, regret, and the struggle between illusion and truth. The singer expresses a sense of being disconnected from others ("I'm nobody's friend") and feeling the weight of their own misfortune. They acknowledge their addiction and how it has tainted their affection for everything good.
The mention of an "elephant in the room" and shooting at the moon suggests a sense of avoiding or deflecting issues that should be addressed. The singer encourages giving everything one has, pursuing ambitions with intention and inventiveness. However, an undercurrent of doubt and uncertainty is present as they question the worth and consequences of their actions.
The reference to a "mild ambition" and the regret of repressing their true feelings hint at a desire for authenticity. Yet, there seems to be a conflict between embracing the failure and embracing the myth of delight. The mention of a "exploding whale" symbolizes a catastrophic event, perhaps reflecting the consequences of suppressing one's true self or living in illusion.
The lyrics also touch on the ideas of poison or powdered milk, premonition, superstition, and the wonders of the world. The singer struggles with the need to obscure or distort their reality and the tension between fortune or faith. It is a battle between illusion and truth, regret and consent.
As the song progresses, the singer questions the consequences of their actions, reflects on their attempts to obscure the wonders of the world, and wonders if history will remember their failures or successes. The line "embrace the epic fail of my exploding whale" suggests a willingness to accept and learn from their mistakes and failures, as painful as they may be.
Overall, "Exploding Whale" explores the complex emotions and struggles one faces in navigating their own loneliness, addiction, and the search for authenticity amidst a world filled with illusions and regrets.
Line by Line Meaning
I'm nobody's friend
I do not have any close relationships or companions
Loneliness rides in my bed
Feelings of isolation and emptiness dominate my life
My misfortune
I am plagued by a series of unfortunate events
Give everything you've got
Put all your effort and energy into your actions
While the sun burns hot
Take advantage of the present moment and seize the opportunity
My addiction
I am trapped and consumed by a harmful habit or dependency
Spoils my affection
My addiction ruins my ability to feel love and positive emotions
For everything good
I struggle to appreciate and enjoy the positive aspects of life
Elephant in the room
An obvious problem or issue that is being ignored or avoided
Might as well shoot at the moon
Attempting something extremely difficult or improbable
The mild ambition
A small desire or goal
Jump the Fosbury flop with intention
Approach a situation with a unique and intentional strategy
Pursue your invention
Follow your creative ideas and innovations
As something of worth
Believe in the value and significance of your endeavors
The thing I most regret
The action or choice that brings me the most remorse
Is having to repress what I'm feeling
Feeling compelled to hide or suppress my true emotions
While expressing delight as a myth
Pretending to be happy or content when it is not genuine
Embrace the epic fail
Accept and learn from the significant failures or disappointments
Of my exploding whale
The disastrous outcome caused by my actions or choices
Poison or powdered milk (poison or powdered milk)
A choice between something harmful or something seemingly harmless
Paralyzed as it took (paralyzed as it took)
Being unable to move or act due to the consequences of the choice
Premonition (what is going on?)
A forewarning or intuition about a future event
Before your life is caught in conditions
Take action before you become trapped in unfavorable circumstances
Be the first of its victims
Avoid being negatively affected by the situation like others
The foot of a hare
The insignificance or powerlessness in comparison to others
Action or consequence (action or consequence)
The result or outcome of one's actions
My unyielding defense (my unyielding defense)
My firm and unwavering protection or justification
Superstition (what is going on?)
The belief in supernatural influences or irrational practices
My attempts to obscure
My efforts to hide or conceal
The wonders of this world
The marvels and beauty existing in the world
Be it fortune
Whether it is luck or chance
Or faith in distortion
Or having trust in distorted or misleading perceptions
The patron of prayer
The guardian or supporter of prayer
The thing I most resent
The action or situation that I hold the strongest bitterness towards
Is having to consent to illusion
Being forced to agree or give permission to deceptive or false beliefs
While confessing distress with my fist
Expressing feelings of anguish or pain through physical aggression
Will history prevail?
Whether the past events and actions will ultimately dominate
My exploding whale
The catastrophic failure or collapse caused by myself
What of a dream deferred
What happens to a dream that is postponed or delayed
My appeal in reverse
My attractiveness or desirability being turned around or diminished
Apparition
A ghostly or elusive appearance or manifestation
Embrace the epic fail
Accept and learn from the significant failures or disappointments
Of my exploding whale
The disastrous outcome caused by my actions or choices
Lyrics © BMG Rights Management
Written by: Sufjan Stevens
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind
Jonathan Emden
I don't know whether this thought will resonate with anyone else: The artistic phases of someone like Sufjan Stevens are a clear reminder of the way in which the self can grow and go through phases. To me, it embodies the idea that there is no fixed self. Depending on our choices and experiences, the soul has the ability to grow. The self, too, which is a construction and encompasses how we define ourselves, how we present ourselves and the values we believe has the capacity to grow and change. There is an ultimate core within each person which is fairly defined, but much about who we are can grow and change, if we are open to it.
I appreciate that Mr. Stevens is not static as an artist. Because as a living thing, he is most likely not static as a person.
JOSE ANTONIO GRANADO SANCHEZ
This boy and his music, has changed my vision of music....
It’s really magic, simple, strong, beautiful, emotional... I’m discovering slowly every song, every album....and falling in love of his music and lyrics...
A big kiss from Barcelona....
Yoshi Ninjj
Né cara
Joe Webb
i got into Sufjan somewhere in that 5 year gap between Age of Adz and Carrie and Lowell, and Exploding Whale might have been the first release of his I was excited for. it's a special, special song that doesn't get enough credit among his bigger singles. pure magic
Danielle Andrews
i dont know how, but sufjan's music always strikes a cord deep within my heart. this is such a beautiful song.
Vane Vane ꈍᴗꈍ
Me relaja muchísimo su música, me inspira y me hace reflexionar con cada palabra de sus canciones ♥️♥️♥️
BiagioFoglia
Your music is amazing, it reflects my soul too much.
I've been following you for 10 years and will never stop doing it.
You are unique <3
no name
love this song and your music in general, it's just so unique!
Elliot Björksdóttir
one of my absolute all time favorites by Sufjan. The music production on this is a master piece <3
Graham Exton
This is new to me and it's beautiful. It touches my heartbone.