Andrew Bird: Danse Carribe

If you have six minutes to spare for something beautiful today, here is what you need to see. And yes, perhaps I'm doubly biased because of my deep admiration for Andrew Bird and my nostalgia for the Northern Midwest landscape, but still. This is stunning.

Andrew Bird: Danse Carribe
From the new album, Break It Yourself (released today!), via Pitchfork TV.

Andrew Bird: Break It Yourself

Oh happy day! Andrew Bird's new album Break It Yourself (due out on March 6th) is an NPR's First Listen feature. For a limited time, you can listen to the album in it's entirety. NPR, you are just lovely.

Sorry, don't have time to write. I have to go listen.

Andrew Bird: Oh No

When I was a kid, I always felt sorry for all the poor kids who lived in warm climates and didn't get to have snow days! Today, work was canceled, so I got to spend the day tucked warmly inside, listening to Andrew Bird's Noble Beast, working on my new novel, and making delicious cornbread with honey butter (if it turns out well, I'll post the recipe on Friday). I wish every day could be a snow day!

So you can enjoy a bit of my lovely day, too, here's a cool live version of "Oh No."


Andrew Bird: Oh No

Andrew Bird: Noble Beast Tour

This weekend, Kevin and I were ridiculously excited to find out that Andrew Bird was coming to the college we work at. Somehow, we managed to find a couple students who weren't going to use their tickets (I was sure *no one* would want to give them up), and we tried not to look too old as we walked into the packed auditorium (we also had to hide a couple yawns around 10pm when the rest of the audience was apparently just getting *started* with their evening).

The show was phenomenal, and you should definitely check out the tour dates. I've been a fan of Andrew Bird since he was Andrew Bird's Bowl of Fire in the late 90's, but I've never seen him live. So it was fun to see little details in person. (Like, oh! that eerie background part is actually Andrew Bird whistling!) The set was perfectly whimsical, with Alice-in-Wonderland-sized, brightly colored phonograph-style speakers hovering over the musicians. The performance was terrific. Apparently, he had been trying to kick a fever for the last few days, and still he threw himself into the songs like he had all the energy in the world.

But the most striking thing about seeing Andrew Bird live was the extensive looping. He would play a few bars, loop it (which basically means you've created a recording of it that comes back over and over again through the speakers), loop something else over that, and so on until you felt like you were just being washed over with sound. If you don't know what I'm talking about, you can see it in this video. The first thing that he plays comes back again and again, and he's playing and looping more things over it as it goes along. The result was breathtaking.



Here's Natural Disaster, another song I like off Andrew Bird's new album, Noble Beast, that he played at the show:

Andrew Bird: Live on KEXP

I was browsing around KEXP's live performance archives, and came across some pretty cool live performances by Andrew Bird.

Those of you from the Northwest will certainly know KEXP since it is hands-down one of the coolest radio stations out there. It's listener-supported, the djs actually help pick their own music, play requests, and support local bands. You know, a *real* radio station!

I've been a fan of Andrew Bird since I first saw him play violin with the Squirrel Nut Zippers. I was (and still am) completely addicted to his quirky, swing-tinged 1998 album Thrills. I once had a poetry professor who advocated that great poets can "look at the world strangely." Andrew Bird is a master of that skill.

The KEXP live performances were recorded in September '07 and include songs from his newest, very gorgeous album, Armchair Apocrypha. I love his strange uses of the violin, odd tonalities, and strikingly beautiful melodies. Live, the songs are even more sparse and dreamy than they are on the album.

Listen to Andrew Bird live on KEXP here. Click "concert.wma" or "concert.rm" to hear the whole performance straight through. Or click on the song titles to hear them individually.

Read an article about KEXP from Paste Magazine here.

Sounds Eclectic: Nic Harcourt's Best of 2007

It's time, it's time for KCRW's Nic Harcourt to make the judgment call on the best songs of 2007. Last year's show got me hooked on Band of Horses. What will this year bring?

You can listen to the entire show here. It aired on Sunday, but I'm just getting around to it today.

Well, what do you think? Agree? Disagree? What are *your* favorite songs of 2007?

Off the top of my head, mine would have to include:

• Sister Rosetta Goes Before Us from the new Alison Krauss/Robert Plant collaboration.

• It would be hard to single one out from Andrew Bird's stellar album Armchair Apocrypha, but I have to say I'm partial to the quirky swing of Imitosis.

• And yes, oddly, Harper Simon's version of Yankee Doodle. I'm telling you, against all odds, he makes you like that song. :)