Andrew Bird "Sychophantitis" Live at High Noon Saloon Madison, WI Feb 17, 2006

Before saying anything else, I'd like to note that the crowd at this show was probably the rudest I've ever seen in Madison. Two-thirds of the room spent the entire show talking loudly, drowning out most of the opening set by Haley Bonar. As if that weren't bad enough, a couple individuals felt the need to make drunken shout-outs from the bar and drop glasses on the floor in the middle of the room. The amazing thing is that this is becoming endemic at the High Noon, while venues that skew younger (such as the Annex) don't appear to have any such problem.

Anyway.

I wasn't part of the 2005 aging hipster circlejerk over Andrew Bird (or Antony & the Johnsons or Sufjan Stevens, for that matter), but I found The Mysterious Production of Eggs to be enjoyable enough, as did Emily, so it seemed like it would be worth going to his show. Other than the awful audience, it was -- he played a number of new songs, like this one, and was really impressive as a performer. He switched from violin to guitar and from whistling to singing with ease and built up long songs that never felt as long as were (except when I was watching to recording clock on the camera tick over eight minutes(!) on one song). His stage demeanor was pretty good, too, and while I'm still not blown away by his music, I think I'd go see him again if he played somewhere in Madison other than the High Noon.