It's Sufjan Stevens Way or the Highway

Sufjan Stevens is the state-hopping singer-songwriter-cum-comic-book artist who's produced a multi-media spectacle (featuring hula-hoopers, no less), all the while repudiating"the white noise of information." We met at the Diner on 9th Avenue to discuss the release of The BQE, a CD/DVD package documenting the "symphonic and cinematic exploration of New York City's infamous Brooklyn-Queens Expressway" he debuted with projections, an orchestra, ornate wings, and hula-hoopers over three nights at BAM in 2007. The collection, out via Stevens's label, Asthmatic Kitty, features the soundtrack, the film footage used in the projections, a 40-page booklet with liner notes and photographs, a "stereoscopic 3-D Viewmaster® reel," and a BQE-themed Hooper Heroes comic book he worked on with his friend, the illustrator Stephen Halker.  The comic follows three extra-terrestrial orphan Heroes, Botanica, Quantus, and Electress, who use hula-hoops "to combat the ‘the Messiah of Civic Projects,' Captain Moses, and his totalitarian social architecture." Read the full interview on Interview Magazine.