Songwriters and Asthmatic Kitty labelmates Sufjan Stevens and Angelo De Augustine have announced a new collaborative album A Beginner’s Mind, due out Sept. 24. Beginning when the artists embarked on a songwriting retreat at a friend’s cabin in upstate New York, the project developed after the pair noticed their music reflecting the movies they’d watch daily to unwind. The result is an album inspired by classic films, leading to “less a “cinematic exegesis,” per a press release, and more a “rambling philosophical inquiry” that allows the songs to free-associate at will.”
The album itself is named after the Zen Buddhist concept of “shoshin,” which refers to the state of seeing and accepting the world around you openly, like a child. Stevens and De Augustine employed that mindset to write music without preconceived notions restricting the creative flow.
The pair have released “Reach Out” and “Olympus,” ahead of the album, both undeniably gorgeous and personal acoustic-based tracks from two songwriters renowned for their specialty in that field. Featuring lyrics that drift from the confessional to the divine, the artists sound centered, vulnerable and alive. “Reach Out” arrives with a video shot by the two artists, featuring their beloved dogs and edited by Jess Calleiro.
Watch the video for “Reach Out” below, and scroll further down to revisit De Augustine’s Paste Studio session. Keep scrolling for the Daniel Anuum Jasper-designed cover art and tracklist for A Beginner’s Mind, which you can preorder here.
A Beginner’s Mind Album Art:
A Beginner’s Mind Tracklist:
01. Reach Out
02. Lady Macbeth In Chains
03. Back To Oz
04. The Pillar Of Souls
05. You Give Death A Bad Name
06. Beginner’s Mind
07. Olympus
08. Murder And Crime
09. (This Is) The Thing
10. It’s Your Own Body And Mind
11. Lost In The World
12. Fictional California
13. Cimmerian Shade
14. Lacrimae
