The newest contribution to the Yellow Bird Project comes straight from the creative mind of the ever impressive Andrew Bird. Hailing from Chicago, Illinois, Andrew and a bike riding peacock are here to join the Yellow Bird party. Coming to expect nothing but extraordinary things from his music, it’s now clear that his creativity transcends into shirt design too.

Profits from sales of this quality torso protector will go to help the folks at Pegasus Special Riders continue to provide adults and children with special needs the complete equine therapy experience. Every week clients enjoy horse riding lessons and involvement within the riding centre in a fun and safe environment.

Click here to see (and buy??) Andrew Bird’s “Peacock On A Bike”.

Photograph above, taken by Megan McIsaac.

I just got back from a music festival in the town of Saint Malo in the northwest of France called Route de Rock. This town which is home to many famous french explorers, including Jacques Cartier, turned out to be a beautiful setting for a long weekend of music.

There was also one YBP shirt spotting (Bon Iver).

The National was the lone YBP band to take the stage and they played a great set. This was my first time hearing them play either live or recorded. I was so impressed by their level of talent. The lead singer really amazed me in his ability to channel so many different emotions even throughout a single song and with such a range of different voices. I had never really heard anything like it before. They craft there music in a really interesting and unique way. In some songs it is like they have 5 seperate concepts that they use and reuse throughout the song without an identifiable chorus or verse. That reptition had this very seductive quality that would really suck you into the music. The songs Runaway and  Afraid of Everyone are good examples of this.

The band that played after the National was the Flaming Lips whose music I was more familiar with beforehand because of some of their very famous songs like: do you realize, yoshimi battles the robots and waiting for superman.

The song waiting for superman was allegedly written about a conversation that the lead singer (Wayne Coyne) had with his brother as his father was dying of cancer. He asked his brother how his father was doing to which his brother replied “Its getting heavy”. To which he replied” I thought it was already as heavy as can be”.

The first verse goes

I Asked you a question
I didn’t need you to reply
Is it gettin’ heavy?
But then I realized
Is it gettin’ heavy?
Well I thought it was already as heavy as can be

I really like the imagery of the middle verse of this song although I am not exactly sure what he intended when he wrote it.

Is it overwhelming
To use a crane to crush a fly?
It’s a good time for Superman
To lift the sun into the sky

Peronsally, I think it’s a great metaphor for the damage we are doing to the planet. The distance between our actions and the sometimes tragic consequence are so large in time and scope that we are numb to it and unwilling to take responsibility. The image of using a crane to crush a fly reminds me of that distance.

Take for instance the recent tragic floods in Pakistan. The floods were influenced by the rapid melting of glaciers in the himalyan mountain range. It is a similar problem to what I saw first hand in Bolivia where I travelled earlier this year, where the glaciers are retreating so fast that they are devastating entire towns dependent on agriculture. The distance though between someone getting in their car and thus making a small increase to the carbon layer in the atmosphere in space and then someone dying years later in Pakistan is too big to affect most people. It’s a small world but one that can be equally distant and impersonal.

So, I’m proud of what Matt, Casey and the rest of the YBP community have achieved in briding that gap. There is obviously a lot of work to be done on all the issues that YBP supports, but as a community we can make a difference.

This is just too good not to post. Most notably, the triumphant 11 minute title track,  “All Delighted People”; an ode to Paul Simon’s “Sounds of Silence”. Listen, and enjoy.

P.S. Notice the typeset on his album cover – same font YBP !!

A few weeks ago we posted our new music video for our theme song, “A Field Of Birds”. Now, Jonathan Lindley takes us behind the scenes! A few words from Jonny, below…

When i set out to make this animation i had no idea were to start. So, i had to resort to something i knew how to do, or rather something i already felt comfortable with. i ended up drawing the characters before understanding the story or setting and after a while it just built momentum. I’ve always found the start the most difficult, once you get enthusiastic about an idea, thats the time to challenge yourself! If you can do all this your bound to learn something new!

When I started this project, I was strictly a graphic designer, i risked my degree on this video. If it had gone wrong, I would have failed my final major project and not got a degree, which would have bankrupt me and left me qualification-less. Thankfully it all seems to have paid off and people seem to like it.

The scariest part of making it was the first time I watched it! I didn’t watch the video for weeks, I was a good 5 days behind schedule all the time. I was already being forced to cut corners, around the middle of the video I realized that there wasn’t anything interesting happening and nearly had a nervous breakdown. i pulled two all nighters and cut out around 20 moles and managed to animate them in, just in time for the final cut!

In case anyone is considering animation I know now that there are more efficient ways to do all these things but being inexperienced and only planning a limited amount of my animation, I ran out of time for experimentation and had to get on with the making it. I absolutely appreciate animation and the genius behind the trade, when I watch stop motion videos now I just see the time spent on making each scene!

Lip syncing, the bane of my life, well, eventually I found a way around spending years learning how to do this professionally, I was lucky in that the design of the video didn’t need it to be perfect but i still had to figure out a way of timing it rightish… in the end what i did was film myself singing along with the song, and the go through the video frame by frame and just cut out a different mouth that was kinda the same shape. Easily the most boring job ever!

Having said all of this, it was worth it in the end! I am super proud to have helped out a charity, earnt a degree and made a pretty cool little animation for ‘The Tallest Man On Earth’ who I am a big fan of! Then the really scary part was unleashing it to the world which has been very positive and rewarding, again huge thanks to Yellow Bird Project and Huddersfield University!

Jonny

You can watch the “behind the scenes” video on Jonny’s vimeo page and see more pictures on his Flickr page.

And if you still haven’t seen the final cut, watch it here!

Why are pirates cool..? Because they ARRR!

Why are our friends at Meet You At The Show so awesome? Because they’ve planned an amazing city-wide treasure hunt in collaboration with Pop Montreal. If you live in Montreal, then you must join the game! And if you don’t, what a great reason to plan a trip! Can’t think of a better way to explore the ol’ hometown. The hunt begins on August 28th, and there are plenty of great prizes to be won, including some rad YBP gear!

Check out Meet You At the Show’s website for more details.