Sufjan Stevens: The BQE

Sufjan Stevens Presents The BQE CD/DVD With Viewmaster Reel
180-Gram Vinyl And Comic Book Due October 20

Sufjan Stevens

Indie folk darling Sufjan Stevens premiered The BQE, a musical film exploring New York City’s infamous Brooklyn-Queens Expressway, at the Brooklyn Academy of Music’s Next Wave Festival in November 2007. The critically applauded performance that featured 36 performers included a wind and brass ensemble, string players, a horn section, projected film footage of the expressway and five hula-hoopers. On October 20, Asthmatic Kitty Records will release The BQE.

The comprehensive package features the CD soundtrack, the DVD of the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway film footage, a 40-page booklet with extensive liner notes & photographs and an accompanying stereoscopic 3-D Viewmaster reel. Furthermore, Stevens will release a limited edition double gatefold vinyl edition of The BQE on 180-gram vinyl with a large-scale 32-page booklet including liner notes, photographs and a black and white version of a 40-page BQE-themed Hooper Heroes comic book.

On October 24, 92YTribeca will host the premiere screening of The BQE DVD with an introduction by Stevens. Tickets for this event go on sale July 23 here.

The concept behind The BQE is based largely on the history of New York’s Brooklyn-Queens Expressway — 12.7 miles of urban roadway built between 1939 and 1964 by master urban planner Robert Moses. The Viewmaster, unveiled at the 1939 NYC World’s Fair, was intended to promote 3-D panoramic illusions of the American landscape and serve as advertising for various tourist destinations and motivation for American drivers. The Hooper Heroes comic book, written by Stevens and drawn, colored and inked by collaborator Stephen Halker, follows three extra-terrestrial superhero sisters who use hula-hoops to combat “the Messiah of Civic Projects,” Captain Moses.

THE BQE- A Film By Sufjan Stevens from Asthmatic Kitty on Vimeo.