Gramophones and Leprosy

Sonja and I went to see Andrew Bird at the Opera House last night.


Although I'm a bit of a music snob and completely into music for all it's worth, I'm not completely into musicians. When I was in high school, I used to scour the Internet for the latest bits of gossip about my favourite artists. But then I stopped. I don't know what sparked it, but I think adding the visual to the audio was completely unneccesary. Knowing about musician's lives didn't add to the music for me; it just took away from it. For me, video truly did kill the radio star.

With that being said, I had no idea Andrew Bird was a master whistler. Which is kind of embarassing, I suppose, seeing as this is what he is known for, and probably where he earned his monicker.

But even more, I'd have to say that Andrew Bird is the best all-around musician I've ever seen live. Hawksley Workman puts on the most entertaining shows, Ted Leo is the best guitarist I've ever seen, but Andrew Bird is capable of playing possibly every musical genre, and playing it well. (However, this was not the best show I've ever seen. I'm not quite sure what musician garners that honour. Andrew Bird himself, as a personality, kind of bothered me. He seemed to have an air of hubris combined with his eccentricity. He's the kind of guy who never had to fight for a music deal--he probably had it handed to him. But when you're that accomplished of a musician, I suppose a little egoticism is in order.)

He had a double-sided gramophone on stage that was miked, and when Andrew Bird pressed a pedal, it would spin rotationally. He sampled one of those children's barn-yard animal noise toys. He could whistle each note on his xylophone dead-on, and when he was playing his violin like a violin (rather than like a guitar, which is what he did for half the show), he could make it mimic his voice and vice-versa.

Also, if you're trying to figure out what to put in your parents Christmas stocking, an Andrew Bird album is a sure bet--one fifth of the crowd last night had grey hair and bald spots.

It was phenomenal.

And then I woke up this morning with pink eye.

I successfully avoided my annual third-week-of-school-cold by popping Cold FX pills like there's no tomorrow, but I knew my good health was too good to be true.

I've never had pink eye before, so I have no idea how I even got it. Possibly from failing to remove eye makeup? Or perhaps from my bad habit of continuously sticking my fingers in my eyes to readjust my contacts throughout the day?

Well, today is glasses on. I can't get in to see a doctor until tomorrow morning. The Internet advises that I shouldn't go to work, since I'm highly contagious, but I'm set to interview the former editor of Chatelaine today (thankfully, it's a phone interview, but I need to use the phones at school). And today is the first masthead meeting for McClung's. (I was going to bake brownies for everyone at the meeting, but that's been chopped off my list of things to do.) And today I have to write assignment letters, and do research and hopefully do more interviews. And I have to write assignment letters for McClung's winter issue.

The worst thing about pink eye, apart from having to replace all my eye makeup (and all I own is eye makeup), is not what it looks like. It's the fact that people shudder in fear, that they too will be inflicted with the dreaded zombie eyes. I might as well be a leper.*

_____________________________________________________________

*Leprosy isn't actually contagious. But that's beyond the point.