Sufjan Stevens is no stranger to Christmas music. He is, in fact, close friends with Christmas music, maybe even lovers—or perhaps, given at times the inexplicable bitterness and oddity of his Christmas releases, ex-lovers. In 2006, Stevens released a 42-track compilation of five years’ worth of Christmas-themed EPs, Songs for Christmas, and on Nov. 13 he released the follow-up, Silver & Gold: another five years and another 58 tracks, a blend of original songs and creative covers of classics. Silver & Gold brings you about one-third Sufjan Stevens originals with...

With the rain setting in and dampening both toes and spirits, a well-decorated interior space is a necessary respite from the gloom. Luckily, brightening your home or dorm room is easily done with a bit of glue, construction paper and a DIY attitude. Preserve the colors of fall by pressing leaves in old textbooks (or current ones you never read). Place the leaves in between two pages near the middle of the book, or between two sheets of waxed paper under a stack of heavy objects, and leave to press...

If you’re anything like me, you know that the day after Thanksgiving is far too late to begin ushering in the Christmas season. The appropriate time is the third week of October, which is when the Tacoma Holiday Food and Gift Festival takes place at the Tacoma Dome. The five-day festival boasts live entertainment, cooking displays, impressive decorations, a resident Santa and over 600 merchant booths. This year’s show was the 30th anniversary and spanned the days between Oct. 17 and 21. The atmosphere of the Holiday Food and Gift...

The coming of autumn brings a host of delights: colorful leaves, cocoa-drinking weather and, most importantly, new seasons of our favorite TV shows. For many of us, that means the highly anticipated seventh season of British sci-fi masterpiece Doctor Who. Debuted in 1963, Doctor Who is the longest-running sci-fi show in history. The show follows the adventures of the Doctor, a 900-odd-year-old Time Lord from the planet Gallifrey. With the help of his blue police-box-shaped spaceship and time machine, the TARDIS, he travels the universe with a succession of companions,...

Bloom - Beach House (May 15) Beach House’s aptly-titled fourth studio album progresses like an algae bloom over deep water, one that washes over you and gets in your eyes and ears and mouth. Bloom takes it slow, allowing the dreamy synth, electro-drones and deliberately plodding guitar to sink in, accentuated by vocalist Victoria Legrand’s breathy, commanding alto. Individual tracks on this album are less like linear stories than they are like portraits of emotions, most commonly bittersweet wistfulness grounded in the sighs of jaded youth. This is a sentiment...