Last night’s Andrew Bird show was the third time around for me. We first saw Bird at Berklee several years ago with the Magnetic Fields. For me, at least, that was an eye-opening experience. That time it was just Bird and his violin pretty much, and he was playing a lot of songs from Weather Systems, which, when I’m getting serious about it, might be my favorite of his albums. That record feels intimate and it explores echoes and open spaces (or the qualities of closed ones, perhaps) and resonance in a beautiful way. With the Mysterious Production of Eggs, you could make a cheesy metaphor (and yes, a pun) and say that he came out of his shell a bit… or maybe more accurately that he started to decorate his shell a bit more and threw more light on it and paired it with another shell or two. Anyway, the sound starts to get more elaborate and he keeps building on his ideas. The latest record, Armchair Apocrypha, continues in that direction. It’s an even more collaborative effort than his last, though it still could only be his record (at least, these ears feel that way). This time his live mate, Martin Dosh (I think last night Bird called him the true master of the loops or something like that–he does a lot with atmospheres, electronic sounds, and percussion), added his talents to the concoction.

So, having set the stage, as it were, here’s a rundown of the show.

We arrived slightly late and missed the first couple of Joan as Policewoman’s tunes. Doug knows her music much better than I do, and I’m sure he can describe her work more successfully than I can (in fact, he can probably describe most things more successfully than I can, but I digress…) She played organ and guitar (not at the same time) and sang, chatted between songs, breathing heavily into the mic (well, hey, it takes a lot out of you to hold some of those notes)… I liked her last few tunes the best–one she said was about imagining herself as the Statue of Liberty, another was for Elliott Smith. She praised rooms that are made to be filled with music, which is something that I thought, too, sitting there in the music hall. It’s definitely not a club feel–you don’t get that up close sensation with the performer (at least, I didn’t from the balcony), but you DO get an up close experience with the music, and it sounded great.

About twenty minutes later, Bird, Dosh, and Jeremy Ylvisaker (Bird said he’s in a band called Alpha Consumer) took the stage. Ylvisaker played bass and guitar in some of the songs, though in many cases his role seemed pretty small. Bird still took the bulk of the playing, plucking and strumming and playing violin and guitar, whistling, tapping on the glockenspiel, singing, spinning one of those toys that makes animal noises (that’s a terrible description… can’t recall the name of it), generally percussing (is that a word?) and such. The setlist in full was as follows:

1. Intro
2. Imitosis
3. Fiery Crash (A good one, with lots of layers of sound)
4. Cataracts
5. Nervous Tic Motion of the Head to the Left
6. Why? (I like this one. Bird does it all himself on this one, and while he really “performs” it, I still enjoy it. It works.)
7. Masterfade
8. Dear Dirty (He said this was his favorite of the songs that didn’t make it onto his latest album. It’s on Fingerlings 3.)
9. Plasticities (This is a favorite off of the new record. During this one, I noticed that his guitar playing is almost delicate compared to what I often see at “rock” shows. I don’t know if it’s because he’s a violinist or just because he’s most concerned about playing the music and not necessarily appearing to “rock,” but he achieves a lot without waving his arms around–it seems to be more in the wrist and fingers. After this tune, he introduced us to his sock monkey, Nighthanger. Someone in Detroit made it for him. Even from the balcony I could see it’s nice little suit, and he told us that it has a violin case, with violin, and a number of other cute details. I couldn’t help thinking, “monkey suit.” Nighthanger totally fits the vibe.)
10. Heretics (Yet another good one from the new record.)
11. Simple Exercises (A Dosh song, with new Bird embellishments and lyrics. On the album it’s “Simple X.”)
12. Armchairs (Another fave from the new album.)
13. Skin Is, My
14. Scythian Empires

Encore:

1. Glass Figurine (From Thrills. I don’t know that album terribly well, but Ez tells me his live version was very different from the recorded one. It was quite nice, really.)
2. Tables and Chairs

My only disappointment is that he didn’t really play anything off of Weather Systems, though, as Ez pointed out, a lot of songs build on ideas from Weather Systems, so it’s almost like he did.

This entry was posted on Thursday, May 17th, 2007 at 12:00 am and is filed under Blather, friends, music. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.