I am now firmly of the opinion that Chicago's Andrew Bird is truly a musical genius. His show at The Basement on Saturday night was one to behold. The last couple of months in Sydney has seen a string of great live shows. With The Mountain Goats being a 10 out of 10, I would give Mr Bird a strong 9. As you might know by now he performs a one man show whilst somehow juggling 3 instruments at once, not including his remarkable whistling. He began with a long instrumental number which dissolved into "Sovay", followed by "A Nervous Tic Motion of the Head to the Left" and "Measuring Cups", the same opening from Friday night. The thing I found with his live performance is that the songs are all stretched out, mainly to include his looping of violin, which gives his music extra depth and space thereby giving each song a new twist. His violin playing is simply superb and his voice can go from a hushed whisper to a soulful, powerful instrument within seconds. I also find his lyrics to be little vignettes of life with a certain amount of irony and cryptic clues thrown in. He covered a fair amount of his catalogue with a few older tunes plus 4 songs from his forthcoming "Armchair Apocrypha". Judging by what I heard this could be his finest work yet. "Cataracts" and "Dark Matter" were in fact my favourites of the night. Simply stunning, moving songs with amazing depth. Andrew Bird also revealed himself to be a charming performer with a very dry wit. I wish he had played "Fake Palindromes" and "MX Missiles" but I'm being greedy now. Also I'm still not a huge fan of the venue, but with music like this, who cares.

Set List (I don't claim to be an Andrew Bird expert so I stand to be corrected on this-also he plays quite a few instrumental interludes which could be songs in themselves)
Intro
Sovay
A Nervous Tic Motion of the Head to the Left
Measuring Cups
Imitosis
Why?
Glass Figurine
Plasticities
Dear Dirty
Cataracts - MP3
Scythian Empire
Skin Is, My
Dark Matter

Action/Adventure