Sufjan Gives A Tour Of The BQE

Last night Sufjan Stevens's 30-minute orchestral piece The BQE opened its three-night BAM. We're gonna check it out tomorrow -- expect our reaction next week -- and figure we should have as much background info in mind before listening to those suite sounds. Perfect timing, then, that Mr. Stevens and friends have upped a all sorts of trivia over at Asthmatic Kitty. Not only are we introduced to the players, we also get the official word behind the BQE's official bird. Perhaps most interesting, though, are Stevens's creative pieces like an essay on hulla hoops vs. The BQE, which begins with a rhetorical flourish ("What does a Hula Hoop have to do with a crowded urban expressway?") and goes on to answer the query with some brilliant aplomb:

Perhaps a creative exegesis of the hoop might begin to unravel the bureaucratic mysteries of the interstate roadway, the automobile, and the Hula Hoop’s unlikely nemesis: Robert Moses.

Our thoughts on the hoola hoop later. For now, there's also Suf's list of the trash (better described as "detritus") found on the NYPD 76th precinct's BQE patrols. Hey, a top 10 we can't argue!

44 Your briefcase
43 Your Wiffle ball
42 Your toy airplane
41 Your wristwatch
40 Your jewelry
39 Your shell casing
38 Your house key
37 Your half-eaten donut
36 Your old purse
35 Your hutch
34 Your stapler
33 Your fan
32 Your bike pedal
31 Your dead squirrel
30 Your car seat
29 Your coffee cup
28 Your condoms, used, unused
27 Your stuffed animal
26 Your Nerf ball
25 Your volleyball
24 Your air conditioner
23 Your grill
22 Your dinnerware
21 Your romance novel

20 Your running shoe
19 Your comb and brush set
18 Your milk carton
17 Your screwdriver
16 Your seat cushion
15 Your driver’s license
14 Your Chinese menu
13 Your dead goldfish
12 Your wicker chair
11 Your car tire
10 Your tricycle
09 Your Chinese menu. Apparently, you weren’t quite dexterous enough to hold the menu, dial the number, and dodge the Geo Metro that so rudely cut you off.

08 Your mattress. Leave your bedding on the BQE, and the bedbugs most definitely won’t bite.

07 Your dead cat. Actual dirt in which to bury things is at a premium in Brooklyn after all. Perhaps cremation was too expensive?

06 Your used plastic water bottle, now holding mysterious yellow liquid. Perhaps Robert Moses should have considered rest stops?

05 Your chicken nuggets, half-eaten. Did you finally come to terms with industrial food, and think better of your culinary choice? Or did you simply overindulge on the special limited edition McRib and run out of room for deep-fried chicken byproducts?

04 Your cane. Why walk, when you can drive the BQE!

03 Your wedding album! Photos of you and your man together, a lovely African-American couple, seeming happy… but perhaps the album is a record of a day that was something less than your dream, a union that was something less than forever? Picked up by the NYPD, and the cops can’t help but wonder: what happened in your car that day, as you sat in traffic with your bumper pressed against another? What became of your memory then?

02 Your action figures. Bendy Spiderman with bite marks, former fascination of your teething toddler?

01 Your cloth-and-speckled-rubber dot work glove, which lasted through two weeks of day-labor construction gigs, jobs you got while standing at the corner of Flushing and Classon Avenues inhaling the sweet odors of BP Petroleum tankers rumbling over your head.

Good job, Sufjan. Yeah, maybe the dead cat's too high, can't believe you left off a half-eaten bologna sandwich, and weird that the cloth-and-speckled-rubber dot work glove made it to number one, but all said, it was a good year for trash on the side of the BQE.

Posted at 10:28 AM
Tags: Sufjan Stevens