By Adrian Pannett

Quite frankly, 2004 has been a pretty crummy year for ‘new’ discoveries (unless you count yourself as a Keane fan that is). It’s been left to revived old timers (Mission of Burma, Tortoise and Kristin Hersh with 50 Foot Wave) and a gluttony of classic reissues (from Lee Hazlewood, Tindersticks, Gang Of Four et al.) to keep this writer’s weary ears and wallet occupied in this uncommonly fallow year. However, if there’s been just one essential find, then it’s certainly been Sufjan Stevens. Sliding himself into British view with this year’s sublime ‘Seven Swans’, Stevens has turfed out the charisma-challenged charlatans and commerce-centred dullards from the temple of American singer-songwriters. Possessing a) a great voice, b) imaginative songs, c) even more imaginative musical ideas, and d) just a hint of madness, Sufjan Stevens is one of the first from his generation to find himself gravitating towards genuine genius. Now here’s the bad news. Sufjan Stevens isn’t strictly a ‘new’ talent, he’s been hanging around with bonkers religious folkers The Danielson Familie for some time now and he’s been making solo records for four or five years. Damn. But here is the good news, Sufjan Stevens has two other relatively recent albums worthy of acquisition – and here they come in conveniently reissued/repackaged form, still with shrink-wrapped-like freshness.

First up, is his debut double-length ‘A Sun Came!; originally recorded in 1998 and previously released a year or so later. Although primarily cut to four-track with Stevens multi-tasking on the vast instrumental set-up, you could be mistaken into thinking it was a lost collaborative session involving the full-membership of Gorky’s Zygotic Mynci, The Polyphonic Spree and Jah Wobble’s Invaders of the Heart. Cross-cutting all shades of pastoral folk – from medieval to Middle Eastern – along with kaleidoscopic psychedelia and Bacharach-like balladry, ‘A Sun Came!’ certainly isn’t an album that cowers in the face of its author’s lofty aims. Quite the contrary, it’s one of the richest and most diverse debuts of the new millennium, although fans of the near-spiritual serenity found within ‘Seven Swans’ will be slightly taken aback by its sometimes boisterous but charming contrariness.

Perhaps, a more considered – though no less ostentatious – encapsulation of the Sufjan Stevens muse is 2003’s ‘Michigan; given its first domestic release over here by Rough Trade, with two excellent bonus tracks. Despite being built around an unwieldy conceptual tribute to his native state of the same name (albums in honour of all the remaining American States are all supposedly ‘in the pipeline’), ‘Michigan’ is a towering tour de force, full of warmth, intelligence and ingenuity. Again, Stevens arranged, produced and played the bulk of the album with minimal assistance (aside from some hired percussionists, brass players and an array of adorable female backing vocalists) but with a baroque pop ensemble mindset to the fore. Refining the rich melange of styles and shades from his debut Stevens’ stunning third album (another double-set) is the magical missing link between Leonard Cohen’s first album, Nick Drake’s ‘Bryter Layter’, Van Dyke Parks’ ‘Song Cycle’, Jim O’Rourke’s ‘Eureka’, The High Llamas’ ‘Gideon Gaye’, Low’s ‘Secret Name’ and Stereolab’s ‘Sound Dust’. Never showy and rarely indulgent, ‘Michigan’ is a redemptive homage to sadness as well as sorrow, that floors any of its lightweight and lazy competitors. And if there’s been a more soothingly beautiful song led by a banjo released in the last half-decade than For The Widows In Paradise, For The Fathers In Ypsilanti, then your scribe would dearly like to hear it.

Ultimately, where these two albums let themselves down at the last hurdle, is that they almost give us too much. One double-album in an endearing artist’s catalogue will always make you feel a little bloated if satisfied, but two raises the danger of listeners becoming as explosively over-engorged as Mr. Creosote in Monty Pythons’ ‘The Meaning Of Life’. But for many shining examples of wit winning against shit and ambition annihilating apathy, then look no further than these two truly remarkable records.