The Right Suf

Rosie Thomas/Iron and Wine/Sufjan Stevens, Birmingham Glee Club, Sunday May 16th 2004.

This was not what I was expecting. Following several listens of his highly-acclaimed fourth album Seven Swans, I was anticipating a po-faced and precious performance from Sufjan Stevens. Instead, he is wearing a trucker cap emblazoned with 'Michigan' and carrying a marker pen to draw us a map of the state that has inspired his songs and the crazy, hilarious anecdotes that go with them. Coming on like a curious hybrid between Jonathan Richman and Rolf Harris, who'd have guessed Sufjan Stevens would be this funny? Not anyone who had listened to the earnest bible-bashing banjo-picking of Seven Swans for sure, a record which, despite its occasional hushed majesty, is a little bit too neat and polite for my tastes. Live though, and stripped of his backing band, Stevens cuts a vulnerable and likeable figure, his levity and humanity bringing out the best of songs like 'In The Devil's Territory'; 'The Dress Looks Nice On You' and 'He Woke Me Up Again'. It's not often a live performance makes me reassess an album, but that's exactly what Sufjan has achieved with tonight's highly-entertaining show.

Iron and Wine's Sam Beam walks into the bar, and the bartender says 'why the long beard?'. No, I don't get it, either. Beam has drawn a lot of comparisons with Sufjan Stevens, as well as proportionate acclaim, and the superficial similarities of a fellow quietly ruminating over his banjo are undeniable. But whereas Stevens occasionally shows glimpses of indie roots with a touch of Low here and an echo of Mercury Rev there, Beam's sound is more like Simon and Garfunkel dipped in bluegrass. Not that the result is any more mainstream, being darker and angrier in tone than anything Sufjan conjures. Nevertheless, I feel something missing tonight - as impressively crafted as the songwriting and playing seems, I don't feel myself engaging emotionally with the material. Whether this has anything to do with my unfamiliarity with the album, the competing distractions of the girl in the front row continually playing with her hair, or any fault of the performer is up for debate, I guess. Still not sure about the beard, though.

And so to Rosie Thomas, the night's nominal headliner, but possibly the least well-known performer of the trio. Rosie finds some synchronicity in the fact she's playing a comedy club, as she reveals a secret past as a stand-up. With an infectious laugh even crazier than Tabitha Tindale's, a squeaky baby voice that only American women seem capable of getting away with, and a nice line in observational humour (for instance, she comments on the waitress at a nearby Little Chef who was wearing a badge that said 'ASS MANAGER') Rosie may yet find her future lies in cabaret. Being again unfamiliar with her recorded material, the most intriguing aspect of the show for me is the beguiling and almost schizophrenic contrast between Thomas' kooky persona and the classical grace of her singing, heard to best effect on a ditty called 'Crazy'. As with Sufjan Stevens, I can't help thinking that people who experience her songs in the recorded format alone are missing out on many of the distinctive elements of her personality, and by logical extension, her music.

Related links: Stephin Merritt and Sufjan Stevens discuss pop music.

Kitty Empire on the startling rise of an American visionary.

Sufjan pic courtesy of Delusions Of Adequacy.