Masterfade; Andrew Bird

Gothamist.com, my friends:

“Your lyrics are so strangely evocative. A line [from the song Masterfade] like 'You took my hand and led me down to watch a Kewpie doll parade’ really makes me wonder what inspired it.

“I wrote that one when I first moved out to my barn in the country. And I was trying to reconcile being in nature with also trying to set up a studio and struggling with technology. So I’d struggle with it and then go for long walks on the farm and I couldn’t separate the two. I kept seeing zeros and ones in everything. And also as with almost every song it’s not that simple, there’s several threads that go though it. I could also be talking about a relationship, you know. One person in a relationship has their finger on the master fade and can kind of control the reality of the other person with the fade dial. So there’s like three or four stories in that song.”

Here he is!

Well you sure didn't look like you were having any fun
with that heavy-metal gaze they'll have to measure in tonsand when you look up at the sky all you see are zeros
All you see are zeros and ones

You took my hand and lead me down
to watch a Kewpie doll parade
We let the kittens lick our hair and drank our chalky lemonade
It's not that I just didn't care I must admit I was afraid
And I'm awfully glad my finger's resting gently on the masterfade,

Masterfade I could played along
Masterfade I could played mahjong but it just takes too long
And I just can't remember which way the east wind blows
does it matter? If we're all matter what's it matter does it matter
if we're all matter when we're done?
When the sky is full of zeros and ones

I saw you standing all alone in the electrostatic rain
I thought at last I'd found a situation you can't explain
with GPS you know it's all just a matter of degrees
Your happiness won't find you underneath that canopy of trees

If the green grass is 6 the soybeans are 7
the junebugs are 8 the weeds and thistles are 11
And if the 1s just hold thier place the zeros a smiley face
when they come floating down from the heavens

You took my hand and lead me down to watch a papillon parade
We let the kittens lick our hair and drank our chalky lemonade
You squeezed my hand and told me softly that I shouldn't be afraid
'Cause all the while your finger's resting gently on the masterfade, the masterfade

I could played along the masterfade
I could played mahjong but it just takes too long
And who the hell can remember which way the east wind blows
when your lying on the ground staring up at an inverted compass
I mean Christ who knows?