The Mysterious Production of Eggs is a work of sheer genius. Andrew Bird, from his musical beginnings a decade ago as a hot-jazz revivalist fiddler alongside the Squirrel Nut Zippers, has grown into a singular artist. His idiosyncratic vision finds expression in a music that is essentially unclassifiable. Call it some kind of baroque chamber-pop, perhaps. His densely layered lyrics reflect a sensibility similar to a Nick Drake or Elliott Smith without all the gloomy angst, set to light-as-a-feather melodies and motifs. The Mysterious Production of Eggs is a logical extension of 2003's Weather Systems, and in fact at least one track adds lyrics to one of that album's instrumental tracks.
This music is far removed from the swing-derived music of his Nineties Bowl of Fire albums. Bird's violin remains at the music's core -- plucked and bowed, sometimes played like a guitar. But here it's part of an orchestra of sound (most instruments played by Bird himself), rhythms, beats, keyboards and Bird's puckered-lip whistles, a sonic world that builds on the soundscapes of the psychedelic-era Beatles and Dark Side Pink Floyd.
Lyrically, these songs are enigmatic, playful, stream-of-unconsciousness mobius strips of poetry that only slowly reveal their themes. "My dewy-eyed Disney bride what has tried / swapping your blood with formaldehyde? / Monsters? / Whiskey-plied voices cried fratricide!" go the opening lyrics of "Fake Pallindromes." "Measuring Cups" similarly plays with the language:
So you talk about the hand of glory
A tale that's rather grim and gory
Is it just another children's story
That's been de-clawed?
When the tales of brothers Grimm and Gorey
Have been outlawed . . .
"Opposite Day" is an adolescent daydream of a day when all the "normal" kids wake up "in prison or in hell" and the misfits finally fit in. "Youthful indiscretion now is suddenly the norm..." "MX Missiles" hints at the dangers of love and possibly the death of childhood. In fact, childhood and its joys and dangers runs like a theme through the album, as does mortality, the creative process, science and technology. "Tables and Chairs" is a whimsical but deadly serious song, an apocalyptic utopian vision, complete with snacks! I usually don't quote from an album's press release, but the phrase "epic in scope and minute in detail" is quite apt.
The album's artwork, little cartoon-like drawings that illustrate each song's lyrics, give a major clue to the lyrical content; they show block letters that spell out one song's title, "Sovay," on the surface of the water as seen from below. Another, the album's thematic centerpiece "The Naming of Things," shows a similar scene, a person's feet pointing up toward the surface of the water, where waterbugs create wavery Vs as they tread the border between air and liquid. We see a young beauty and the beast (and the beauty's purse) viewed from the knees down. A coffin with wheels, airpipe and an elephant's trunk, rolls down an undulating road. Lines of zeros and ones designating computer code hold up a bed of flowers.
The picture illustrating "Banking on a Myth" depicts a grounded cloudbank strapped with an "available" sign.
We're taking all our myths to the bank
If you could just do him this favor
Although it might involve child labor
Join his entourage
Give him a foot massage
From Star Search to the Philharmonic
He'll get you there with Hooked on Phonics...
go the lyrics, in a circular indictment of our world of media hype and marketing over substance.
After several weeks of listening, both casual and concentrated, I don't know how The Mysterious Production of Eggs will age. I was initially cool toward Bird's previous album, Weather Systems, but it went on to worm its way onto my list of frequently-played discs, where it remains to this day. But whether it makes my own personal Top 10 or whatever, Eggs is an astounding album in many ways and deserves wide recognition. I hope a lot of you will take a chance on it, and give it an opportunity to reveal to you its multifaceted joys.
