Sufjan Stevens and Angelo De Augustine Share Two New Songs: Listen

Sufjan Stevens and Angelo De Augustine have shared another pair of singles from their forthcoming album A Beginner’s Mind. Listen to “Fictional California” and “Back to Oz” below. The latter arrives with a music video directed by Alex Horan and animated by Clara Murray. 

“This was a song that I had written mostly at home in California,” De Augustine said of “Back to Oz” in a press release. He continued:

We finished its lyrics after watching Return to Oz. The words reference an erosion of a central character’s internal reality. A loss of innocence is the impetus for a journey to find inner truth. In the film, Dorothy returns to the world of Oz to find its landscape in ruins and its citizens frozen in stone. Only she can find the ruby slippers and return peace to Oz. Only we can save ourselves, but we first have to remember who we truly are.

Stevens added: “Angelo is mostly known for his intimate home recordings; his music is quiet and confessional. So for ‘Back to Oz’ we decided to go for something flashier. The song has a fun guitar groove, so we gave it some bass and drums, and Angelo even recorded his first electric guitar solo. It’s a sad song—being mostly about disillusionment—but it has a great party vibe too.”

A Beginner’s Mind arrives September 24 via Asthmatic Kitty Records. Upon announcing the project last month, Stevens and De Augustine released lead singles “Reach Out” and “Olympus.” Stevens and De Augustine worked on A Beginner’s Mind at a cabin in upstate New York. At the cabin, the artists watched movies each day, which loosely inspired the record.