Sufjan Stevens, Silver and Gold, album review Born in 1975, the frenetically productive baroque-pop indie oddball Sufjan Stevens was raised by "eccentrics, hippies, spiritualists" whose idea of a Christmas present was "a home enema kit or a toothbrush made from recycled newspapers." Perhaps this accounts for some of his conflicted obsession with the season. He's been making an annual festive EP for friends and family since 2001. The collected tracks (both traditional and original) from the first five years were released as Songs for Christmas in 2006 and their homespun mix of wonder and whimsy blew a crisp, quirky breeze through the rather stodgy yuletide genre. It was as though he'd thrown the turkey, brussels and figgy pudding out the window and put on a quirky impromptu pick'n"mix buffet of fresh crunchy veg, challenging pickles and home-made dips. This year he's delivered a whopping 59-track sackful of songs from his 2006-2010 EPs. It comes with all the trimmings (a poster, fold-your-own star, stickers and temporary tattoos) and it opens with a tender and convivial carolling of Silent Night before skittering into the backwoodsy Lumberjack Christmas, which plays out like a snow globe microcosm of Stevens's style: there's jaunty cynicism ("If the drinking makes it easy/ The music's kind of cheesy/ The specials on the TV/ Ho ho ho ho ho") gleeful loopiness ("I love Santa. He saved Christmas from the martians!") and terse truth ("No one can save you from Christmases Past"). But an abundance of romantic melodies flutter and swirl until you're lost in them: fiddles and geetar-pickin" give way to soft, soothing recorders and layered drifts of gentle vocals, then finally a solo piano and the spectral shiver of a theremin. At times Stevens can be fey and thin or gratingly quirky. But overall the compilation makes its way towards a bigger story of many ideas, emotions and textures. There's a courtly, medieval romance to his Coventry Carol. His Mr Frosty Man bares no relation to the sparkly Fifties classic: it's a freaky, angry Bowie-esque stomp with a claymotion video featuring chainsaws, shotguns and zombies. His Jingle Bells is almost a parody of pouty indie covers, punctured by giggling kids. With its hoof-thudding beat and little mane-tosses of electronica, Christmas Unicorn begins like a child's riddle, before defining its subject as "a Christian holiday... a pagan heresy... a mystical apostasy... a frantic shopper and a brave pill-popper" before melting into bell-tolling doff of the Santa hat to Joy Division's Love Will Tear Us Apart. You don't need to have spent your childhood unwrapping enema kits to share Stevens's intense mixed-emotions about the big day. Download this Christmas Unicorn