Andrew Bird: Fever Year

Andrew Bird's a pretty strange, lonesome kind of guy. Fever Year, the Melbourne Festival film directed by Xan Aranda tracking his insane 165-date year of touring, shows the monkish creative solitude that seems to drive his work. His music dips into folk, jazz, bluegrass, classical and experimental, and he often reworks his songs live on stage, grinding a sea of loop pedals with odd-socked feet. He collaborates with musicians like Annie Clark (St Vincent) and Martin Dosh, but Bird clearly pulls the strings. And so it is with Fever Year. Bird commissioned the film and holds its rights, and it mostly seems like an autobiographical promo-film. Much is made of his ill health – he claims to have had only four healthy days all year – but there are no real “internal agonies” and no real ramifications, except perhaps for a steely relationship with his band members. Fever Year aims to provide a candid portrait of a virtuoso. Sure, Bird's brilliant and eccentric, but there's little explanation of where his verbose poetry and philosophical wit comes from; little exposition of his personal relationships (it seems that his portrayal as a misanthrope was unintentional); and sometimes I felt like I was watching Grand Designs. The concert footage is impressive, and there's a delicacy to how the film evolves, but Bird's still best when heard.

At ACMI. Season finished