Album Review- Andrew Bird- Inside Problems

Where to start with Andrew Bird? I go back a ways to early albums which played off musical eccentricity. I read his bio as being an ancillary member of Squirrel Nut Zippers and attributed those characteristics to his music. At the time, I heard a musician staking out his lineage to Beefheart and Waits. A friend of mine was one of the very earliest supporters (even before my 2005 dalliances) and his music fandom (I think) tends towards jam bands (Bird indeed has music on Internet Archive which tends to be a jam band heavy platform). Coming at another angle- he is alt folk and modern indie (Decemberists, Dr Dog, Father John Misty) leaning into the more eccentric side of singer songwriters like Sufjan Stevens, Beirut, Magnetic Fields, Ben Folds and Eels. It’s then not much of a stretch to think Bird could be a distant cousin to actual comic music like Jonathan Coulton and Weird Al Yankovic. In 2019, Bird released My Finest Work Yet which doesn’t account for people’s tastes, but was one of his most accessible records and I thought fitting of the title. It really showcases his witty lyrics and his ears for melody. Inside Problems feels like a counter to that. If Finest Work was his What’s Going On, well , he’s too quirky to record a Let’s Get It On, but let’s say this focuses on ummm inside problems. If Bird is going to do whatever he wants, he is using this time to throw some evidence of great American songwriting in his CV. There’s no “Sisyphus” here (there’s not many songs that great anywhere) but there’s some great melodys and grooves. A lot has been made of the song “The Night Before Your Birthday” which is Bird is at his most Lou Reed like - on an album that also features a song called “Lone Didion”, a song called “Stop N Shop” which might not exactly sound like the Modern Lovers, and “Never Fall Apart” another song with auditory nods to Reed But it’s not quite the “spot the influence” game that makes the album a winner, because the album is at its best when these sounds go into the proverbial mixer to bring Bird at his most accessible. Bird is still likely to remain a “love him or hate him” proposition but if you gave up on him during the decade since Noble Beast, this is a good time to jump back in.