“…a harrowing record for frightening times.”—Wall Street Journal
“An experimental meditation on hope and hopelessness.”—Entertainment Weekly
“I was rendered wonderfully weightless by a journey that delivered whole galaxies of nuance in a universal context.”—The Independent
“The Ascension is an unrelenting, kaleidoscopic release that asks a lot of its listeners, but it gives back plenty as well.”—FLOOD Magazine
September 25, 2020—The Ascension, the eighth studio album from Sufjan Stevens, is out today on Asthmatic Kitty Records—get it here.
The Ascension, the long-awaited follow-up to Sufjan’s Carrie & Lowell, features singles “America,” “Video Game”—which The New York Times praised for its “upbeat tempo, a melodic hook, and lyrics that bob between the sacred and profane” and Pitchfork called “a stirring call to have faith in yourself, coated sweetly enough to reach a country that may need that message now more than ever,” and “Sugar.”
The Ascension is an indictment of a world crumbling around us—and a roadmap out of here. Sufjan says the foundations of the album are “a call for personal transformation and a refusal to play along with the systems around us.”
“My objective for this album was simple: Interrogate the world around you. Question anything that doesn’t hold water. Exterminate all bullshit. Be part of the solution or get out of the way. Keep it real. Keep it true. Keep it simple. Keep it moving.”
The result is a “lush, editorial pop album”—as Sufjan describes it—that finds us all at a “terrifying crossroad.”
SUFJAN STEVENS—THE ASCENSION
- Make Me An Offer I Cannot Refuse (5:19)
- Run Away With Me (4:07)
- Video Game (4:16)
- Lamentations (3:42)
- Tell Me You Love Me (4:22)
- Die Happy (5:47)
- Ativan (6:32)
- Ursa Major (3:43)
- Landslide (5:04)
- Gilgamesh (3:50)
- Death Star (4:04)
- Goodbye To All That (3:48)
- Sugar (7:37)
- The Ascension (5:56)
- America (12:30)
