"Is it all for nothing?" Sufjan Stevens cries out. "Is it all part of a plan?" This anguished outburst arrives about halfway through The Ascension, his first proper solo album in more than five years, on a song named for the seizure and anxiety medication Ativan. Over the track's jittery electronic pulse, he later utters,…

It's been more than five years since Sufjan Stevens released his last proper solo album, the hushed and ghostly acoustic lament Carrie & Lowell. That drought will end next week with the release of a lengthy and electronically inclined new opus called The Ascension. Sufjan has already shared two songs from the project, the doleful&#8...

Next month, Sufjan Stevens will return with The Ascension, his first proper album since 2015's Carrie & Lowell. Stevens has already shared "America," the massive 12-minute closing song that perversely stands as the album's first single, as well as the non-album track "My Rajneesh." Today, Stevens has followed it up with the new song "Vi...

Last week, Sufjan Stevens announced a new album called The Ascension, which will be out in September. A couple days later, we got its 12-minute-long lead single "America." That single is being released on a physical 7" at the end of the month, and on its B-side is another new song called "My Rajneesh," which…

Sufjan Stevens makes music all the time. Earlier this year, for instance, Stevens and his stepfather Lowell Brams collaborated on an ambient instrumental LP called Aporia. But Stevens does not make proper studio albums -- albums full of proper Sufjan Stevens songs -- often enough. The last real Sufjan Stevens album, the fragile and magnificent&a...