Everytime I listen to Sufjan he takes me back there. Every christmas I used to go over to New York and visit my dad to check he hadn't frozen to death amidst the blizzards of Syracuse. It was a Sunday night drowned in a storm which had turned all that beautiful fluffy snow into slush lining the sidewalk. Julia was getting her hair dyed (which was a complete disaster just fyi) and dad and I had gone down the road to this dingey record store. It was one of those places where you just felt "damn I am so cool just for being in this place." The floor was just creaking planks of wood and the high walls were dressed head to toe in records and posters of The Clash, The Ramones and Sid Vicious snorting coke. A tiny staircase lead up to a whole other level of genius trapped in record sleeves. That is when I fell in love with holding the album itself. Owning a piece of the musician. I spent all the money I had left saved up for my trip on a Sufjan Stevens album 'A Sun Came'. To be honest it was probably the worst album he ever made but it was my first Sufjan. Listening to it over and over again, I learnt every word to every song and soon tossed it aside. But sitting on the bus this afternoon iPod shuffle revived my love for Sufjan Stevens and I was filled with what it felt like to be 12 in a beat up, American record store and being super cool. Reminiscing instead of reading my history textbook. Have I made the right decision? I think so.
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