Spinning Plates #6

Once a week, Spinning Plates examines an essential “long player,” an album worth listening through from the first note to the last.

I had purchased Seven Swans after falling to the charms of Illinois, but it sat unheard in my apartment for many weeks before I mustered up the strength to give the thing a listen to. It was, as I recall, a particularly warm Sunday morning in early October. Considering the previous night, I had woken up earlier than I should have and was trying to make the most of my hang-over. On a whim, I loaded Seven Swans into my iPod and decided to take a morning walk around Clifton to blow off the proverbial “stink.” Within five or six minutes, the album had lifted up my weary spirit and cleared the cobwebs from behind my eyes. It’s a rare thing to be profoundly affected by music in such a way. I had underestimated Stevens.

“All the Trees of the Field Will Clap Their Hands” is an interesting, if not particularly moving, opening for Seven Swans. It was the album’s second song, though, that first caught my attention. “The Dress Looks Nice On You,” with its tender lyrics and swelling refrain, easily matches any of the bombast from Illinois in terms of emotional power. The album carries on with a simple, understated eloquence and rarely lags in the way that other albums by Stevens have a tendency to. It’s hard to believe that, of all of his work, this has come to be my favorite. It’s hard not to find some beauty in “He Woke Me Up Again,” though. The album mines the folk and gospel traditions for all of their best attributes and the result is, I daresay, a life-affirming and faith restoring masterpiece.

— Curt Whitacre