We saw Sufjan Stevens tonight at the TLA in Philly. The show was pretty much what I expected, but what I wasn’t expecting was the way he pronounced his name. I’ve always assumed it was “Suff-On,” but he definitely said “Soofy-on” which adds a whole syllable and is much more cumbersome.
The TLA is a decent venue, not unlike the Bowery Ballroom, but smaller, and the floor is sloped, which is nice because you can stand towards the back (where the sound is best) and still see well. The only thing that was annoying was that the bar areas were cordoned off, and you could only drink in the designated area, which led some people to think they could talk and be loud in the bar area during the show. On the plus side, a beer was only $4.25 (compared to $7.00 at Webster Hall (for half as much, I might add)).
I’ve read some disappointed comments about other performances, but Sufjan and his band were super-tight tonight. Maybe it was all the NYC shows that warmed them up. The arrangements were nicely scaled down for the most part, although on a few songs the melodica didn’t quite cut it as a substitute string section. It was great when Sufjan played the Rhodes during “Zombies”—when the music is that tightly scored, some improvisation really stands out as a nice contrast.
They did a lot of cheers in between songs which were cute, and the curtain call was funny. There was one woman there who had made her own Illinoisemaker outfit and traveled all the way from San Francisco to see the show. They, of course, brought her up on stage for one of the cheers. I’m glad he only came back and did one short solo song as an encore. The whole encore concept is so overwrote and phony.
