"PULASKI AT NIGHT" ANDREW BIRD (2013)

A great title track is par for the course when it comes to great albums. If the title track doesn’t cut it, what does that say about the album itself? This month, the Mental Jukebox will be playing some of my favorite title tracks – inspired by @NicolaB_73’s music Twitter challenge, #TopTitleTracks.

Some of the most powerful songs we have are the ones written about the songwriter’s hometown. The majority of songs take on an authenticity and a personal meaning that go far beyond the stereotypes and expectedness. It’s those elements or raw and real that seap into a song’s bones, like John Mellencamp’s “Small Town”, Red Hot Chili Peppers’ “Californication”, Billy Joel’s “New York State of Mind”, and the list goes on. This takes me to Andrew Bird’s title track off I Want To See Pulaski At Night.

I’ve seen Bird perform this a handful of times at various venues—from Terminal 5 to Brooklyn Steel. What strikes me most about the song is its versatility. It was the beautiful violin arrangements that won me over at first. While I’ve seen both full string performances and stripped-down versions, later I came to realize it’s Bird’s love letter lyrics to his hometown of Chicago and the melody that it dances along to that I love most about “Pulaski At Night”.

“I PAINT YOU A PICTURE OF PULASKI AT NIGHT. COME BACK TO CHICAGO. CITY OF, CITY OF LIGHT.”

"IMITOSIS" ANDREW BIRD (2007)

This month, I’m jumping into the #APlaceInTheSong challenge from @JukeboxJohnny2. Great songs have that special ability to describe places in a way that makes us feel like we’re right there. Each day, I’ll pick a track that I think accomplishes that feat.

Music can be quite a remarkable thing to enjoy solo, but I think it’s best when experienced with like-minded fans. My wife and I don’t have a ton of common music interests, but Andrew Bird – among a few other artists – is someone we both agree on. Almost every time he performs in New York City, we make it a date night. For that reason alone, I think I’ve enjoyed his shows even more than I typically would. Bird’s catalog is quite extensive, but thankfully he still plays “Imitosis” from his 2007 album Armchair Apocrypha.

“Imitosis” is, in many ways, a very typical Andrew Bird song in that it’s very atypical. His instrumentation is always daring, bringing in different types for different songs. Here he breaks out the Glockenspiel, which adds a light accent that’s perfect for the track. Moreover, the rhythm seems more influenced by Argentine tango than Americana folk, making the track a playful one. In the live setting, the song really comes alive. I just hope Bird keeps on playing it.

“Tell me doctor, can you quantify The reason why?”

"ETHIO INVENTION NO. 2" ANDREW BIRD (2013)

You can get off to a fast start. You can sustain your opener with the main course, not filler. But can you end on a high note? Sometimes I wonder if recording a strong closer is the most difficult thing to pull off when it comes to album rock. When it comes to the cream of the crop in music, I can think of more strong openers than strong closers. Nonetheless, I still have my favorites which I’ll be featuring on Mental Jukebox all month.

The celestial presence of I Want To See Pulaski At Night makes it my favorite Andrew Bird album. But it’s worth stating, I don’t think there’s even one weak album in his entire catalog. His folky foray into beautifully crafted string arrangements, whistle refrains and wry lyrical explorations never gets old for me. From this album, “Pulaski At Night” is the track that has the most awareness and appearance on Bird’s live set lists. But the closer – “Ethio Invention No. 2” is just as much a thing of beauty.

As the song descends on your earbuds or speakers, I feel simultaneously lifted up into the ether when I hear it. As I mentioned before, there’s a celestial aspect to the entire album. With this closing track, in particular, Bird introduces us to a new galaxy of wonderment. It’s like he was holding out on us the entire album until this last track comes on. The plucks are like flickering stars and the violin interludes are like dazzling comets darting every which way. The track is a journey you take with your mind’s eye, not just your ears.

"TENUOUSNESS" ANDREW BIRD (2008)

I generally gravitate to the music first before the lyrics. But as a writer, I still marvel at well-spun verses and choruses. This month, I’m joining the music Twitter community in #31DaySongLyricChallenge

Day 10

The whistling. The string instruments. The wit. There are many aspects to Andrew Bird’s music that draw me to the music, including his way with words. They can be complex and hard to decipher at times. Many of his songs include long, complicated words, like a modern-day “Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious”. I rarely can repeat the words back, but my ears are glued every single time. “Tenuousness” is one of those classics where Bird started to really play with the sounds and flow of words, not just their meanings.

“From proto-Sanskrit Minoans to Porto-centric Lisboans. Greek Cypriots and harbor sorts who hang around in ports a lot, uh huh.”

"IMITOSIS" ANDREW BIRD (2007)

Each day in December, I’ll be reflecting back on a song from the 2000’s. The decade saw the return of post-punk and the popularization of folk music, all while some of music’s biggest acts gained their indie footing. Thankfully, it’s a period that I can look back at fondly without cringing. #31DaysOf2000sSongs

I didn’t discover the world of Andrew Bird until he was about eight studio albums into his brilliant career. It might be one of my deepest musical regrets. That was a lot of time lost that I could’ve spent pouring through his prolific canon, dissecting album after album, all while whistling along in unison. I missed a ton of shows that would’ve allowed me to hear live renditions of some of his earlier material. Luckily, however, when I caught Bird at Terminal 5 in 2016 I got to hear him play this beauty of a track, “Imitosis”.

Bird’s music covers a wide range of genres, but his base has always been the use of a variety of stringed instruments with a folk rock demeanor. The other more well-known track off of Armchair Apocrypha was “Plasticities” which showcased Bird’s more experimental rock tendencies. This made “Imitosis” stick out like a sore thumb because, if anything, it was a tango. The bass, drums, guitar and violin do what they can to recreate a hot summer night in Argentina. But the ringer was the Glockenspiel, the instrument that gave “Imitosis” its playful character and soul.

“What was mistaken for closeness, was just a case of mitosis.”

"SISYPHUS" ANDREW BIRD (2019)

Pick four songs from any band and you can tell a lot about their sound. This summer, I’m featuring #RockBlocks, four picks from bands across various genres. They might be wildly different from each other, but what binds them together is the fact that they’re all a part of my life soundtrack.

While My Finest Work Yet, as an album title, supposedly started as an inside joke, it wouldn’t be far fetched to suggest it’s Bird’s best. But more impressively, is the fact that he continues to write, record and perform at such a dizzying pace — without showing any signs of slowing down or losing his touch. The wondrous thing about “Sisyphus” is that, twelve albums in, it feels like the quintessential Andrew Bird song.

This was one of the new songs that I had the privilege of hearing live before the pandemic began. In Greek mythology, the figure Sisyphus cheated death twice, but was ultimately sentenced to eternal punishment by Zeus. His sentence: to roll a boulder up a hill in Hades for eternity. In some ways it feels like Andrew Bird has cheated a professional death. Every album has been strong from beginning to end with no lemons. Instead of rolling the boulder up the hill, Bird just keeps rolling along.

“Did he raise both fists and say, ‘To hell with this,’ and just let the rock roll?”

"TRUTH LIES LOW" ANDREW BIRD (2016)

Pick four songs from any band and you can tell a lot about their sound. This summer, I’m featuring #RockBlocks, four picks from bands across various genres. They might be wildly different from each other, but what binds them together is the fact that they’re all a part of my life soundtrack.

Andrew Bird’s music primarily resides in an acoustic world filled with strings, guitars, vocals and his trademark whistle. It’s a world that I escape to often. Lyrically, Bird’s songwriting had been cryptic by default for many years, but by the time Are You Serious came out, Bird got married and his lyrics became more personal. “Truth Lies Low” reflected this significant shift as well as a departure from his natural musical tendencies.

I’ve seen Bird play “Truth Lies Low” twice — once at Brooklyn Steel, once at Terminal 5. The one thing that was clear from both performances is that the song established a different vibe each time, ushering the audience into a different musical realm. The song starts out sounding more like Toro y Moi than Andrew Bird. It has these gorgeous, moody, muted synthesizer sounds and are later joined by a set of sparse guitar riffs. It’s not the typical formula for Bird, but it has become one of my favorite tracks from his last five years.

“So here's another game you can play along where you empty all your blame from your guilty bones.”

"LUSITANIA" ANDREW BIRD (2012)

Pick four songs from any band and you can tell a lot about their sound. This summer, I’m featuring #RockBlocks, four picks from bands across various genres. They might be wildly different from each other, but what binds them together is the fact that they’re all a part of my life soundtrack.

Break it Yourself is one of those albums that I can listen to over and over again. In fact, there have been times when I simply lost track of time and didn’t realize that I was listening to it on repeat. After long, busy, stressful weeks, it’s an album that I can get lost in and find some reprieve. And that’s especially the case with a slow-paced and unassuming track that helps bring up the rear, “Lusitania”.

One of Bird’s finest and most distinct whistling intros kicks off slow and dreamy. The song meanders into the night. Close your eyes and you might just see a ship slowly sinking on a moonlit ocean. But in this case, the Lusitania isn’t a boat, it’s your soul. And even while it sinks, the song seems to lift you up every single time.

“If you loosen liable lips, you keep sinking all my ships.”

"TENUOUSNESS" ANDREW BIRD (2009)

Pick four songs from any band and you can tell a lot about their sound. This summer, I’m featuring #RockBlocks, four picks from bands across various genres. They might be wildly different from each other, but what binds them together is the fact that they’re all a part of my life soundtrack.

For me, Andrew Bird is one of those artists who has never put out a bad album. It seems like he’s comfortably in his own element every single time — even as he explores new instruments and influences album by album. He never goes too far beyond his own natural musical inclinations. Noble Beast is still considered one of his banner LPs, and more than 10 years later he still plays “Tenuousness” pretty regularly on his set lists.

Listening back to “Tenuousness” I’m reminded that Bird has made a living doing things that are slightly off center. His melodies land offbeat. He uses whistling and humming, not as vocal interludes, but as instrumental accompaniment. And for his primary riffs, he replaces the guitar with pizzicato plucking on violin. There have been imitations over the years, but to this day there’s still no one else like Andrew Bird.

“Here's where things start getting weird.”

"PULASKI AT NIGHT" ANDREW BIRD (2013)

I’ve seen Bird perform this a handful of times at various venues—from Terminal 5 to Brooklyn Steel. What strikes me most about the song is its versatility. It was the beautiful violin arrangements that won me over at first. While I’ve seen both full string performances and stripped-down versions, later I came to realize it’s Bird’s love letter lyrics to his hometown of Chicago and the melody that it dances along to that I love most about “Pulaski at Night”.

“I paint you a picture of Pulaski at night. Come back to Chicago. City of, city of light.”

"ROMA FADE" ANDREW BIRD (2016)

One of the smartest, most talented and prolific songwriters in the business is still cranking it out. A few years ago, I heard Are You Serious and was totally taken aback by Track 2. “Roma Fade” has a faster, more intense tempo than what we’re typically used to with Andrew Bird. The pairing of ingenious songwriting creativity and go-to Bird instrumentation like strings and whistling is ridiculously infectious. But it gets even better live. I’ve had the opportunity to hear Bird perform “Roma Fade” twice, and can say that the live elements are even more impressive than the studio recording.

“And if she sees you, it changes you. Rearranges your molecules. And if you see her, it changes her. She’ll be seeing you after school. Here’s where gentlemen avert their eyes. Maybe she’s a gentlemen in disguise.”