Andrew Bird @ 9:30 Club

Perhaps the single most distinctive thing about Bird's performances is his liberal use of a multi-track sampler to recreate his elaborate, almost orchestral songs live using a skeleton crew of performers. Generally, he performs either alone or with electronic musician Martin Dosh on drums and uses the sampler (which he manipulates with his feet) to create live loops of violin, guitar, glockenspiel and vocals. On Sunday night, he performed with something approaching a full band—Dosh on drums and keyboards and Jeremy Ylvisaker on bass and guitar—but the core idea, of building the songs up layer by layer using samples and then tearing them down, remained intact.

Opening song "Imitosis" began with Dosh laying down the drums, which he then sampled and looped, then moving on to the keyboard. Bird then plucked out a Pizzicato melody on his violin in response, looped it and then swapped the violin for a guitar. After singing a few lines, Bird arrived at the chorus, where he showed off one of his many clever couplets. "We are all basically alone/and despite what all the studies have shown/What was mistaken for closeness/was just a case of mitosis" He then grabbed his violin and began playing wildly, a tuft of horse hairs swaying at the end of his ragged bow. This, mind you, was only the first song.

Armchair opener "Fiery Crash" began spectacularly, with all three members of the band forming a sort of drum circle around Dosh. Stomping, clapping and whistling, they built the sort of campfire percussion loop that would feel right at home on an Animal Collective record. The loop eventually faded out as Bird picked up a guitar and started singing the song's verses but upon reaching the chorus, he hit the switch and – bam! – there was the drum loop again.

Live treat "Why?" showed off what might be the real secret of Bird's performances — namely, his easygoing and quietly confident demeanor. Though the song takes the form of Bird having a conversation with himself, he somehow managed to deliver the song's ridiculous lines ("Why did you do that? Why did I do what? I'm just standing here, you know") with a timing and conviction befitting of a comedian.

Throughout the set, yet another Andrew Bird trademark was (quietly?) making its presence felt: two gigantic horn speakers, custom-built by Chicago's Specimen sat at the back of the stage. Though it's unclear whether or not they were actually plugged-in (though I suspect that they were), the two speakers – one a gigantic black and white-striped horn speaker and the other, the "Janus Horn," looking something like a two-headed Victrola – gave the show an ominous backdrop. Halfway through the set, in the midst of a noisy breakdown, Bird hit a secret switch and the Janus Horn began to spin like a giant propeller. According to Specimen this creates an effect that "envelops the listener in a variety of merging wave fronts both emanating directly from the horn, and reflected off surfaces in the environment," though in the drone of noise, I couldn't really tell the difference. "That was a nice, brisk tempo, wasn't it?" Bird joked at the end of the song. "We specialize in tempos here."

Believe it or not, the rest of the set was filled with similarly surprising moments: the introduction of sock monkeys made in the likeness of each band member by a fan in Toronto (Bird's featured both a miniature violin case and a miniature violin!), a tastefully brief plug for the tour's eco-friendly underpinnings (the merch booth sold carbon credit magnets to show goers), the use of clattering pots-and-pans percussion and a pull-string animal sound wheel on the Dosh-penned "Simple X." Bird even briefly played "Dr. Stringz," the silly tune that he wrote specifically for his appearance as a guest star on the children's television show "Jack's Big Music Show."

While these were all fun diversions, it was ultimately the engaging nature of the performance that kept the once chatty audience dead silent throughout the set. When Bird returned to the stage for an encore, he briefly recounted that he was chastised by a fan after his last show at the Black Cat, for not playing his cover of Bob Dylan's "Oh, Sister." "I was like, 'I just poured my heart out and you're mad at me?'" Of course, he then proceeded to play the song and while Dylan covers usually send up a red flag in my book, I wasn't worried in the least. I'll tell you why: because I've always known that Andrew Bird is nothing if not a consistent performer. Sure enough, the cover was solid — a faithful reading that was still distinctively Bird. While I probably could have saved us both a lot of time by simply telling you that Andrew Bird is a reliable live performer from the get-go, I figured I'd keep those of you who didn't know in suspense until the very end. It's not like Andrew Bird would mind anyway — after all, the guy's got talent to spare.