My "gateway" to alt country was a little video I caught at 2am on MTV2 (of all places):
The video was completely charming and had me hooked. The next day, I went out and bought I'm Wide Awake, It's Morning, and the rest, as they say, is history.
Bright Eyes is an American indie rock band founded by singer-songwriter and guitarist Conor Oberst. It consists of Oberst, multi-instrumentalist and producer Mike Mogis, trumpet and piano player Nate Walcott, and a rotating lineup of collaborators drawn primarily from Omaha's indie music scene. Oberst's albums are released on Saddle Creek Records, a Nebraska-based label started with his brother.
Oberst started writing and recording music with a variety of bands as an early teen. He compiled 20 songs into A Collection of Songs Written and Recorded 1995-1997, which became the first album under the moniker Bright Eyes. Oberst, who was born in 1980, had his first Bright Eyes album out before he was out of 11th grade, and while the songs are a predictable mess of styles (everything from acoustic folk to cacophonous drum loops), they laid the groundwork for his future in songwriting.
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Letting Off the Happiness - 1998
At age 18, Oberst released a 10 song album with a more focused sound. Most songs feature a full band (recorded with members of Neutral Milk Hotel and Of Montreal, among others). The songs combine elements of folk, country and indie rock, tied together by Oberst's "beyond his years" lyrical wisdom. The album was mostly recorded in the Oberst family basement on an 8 track reel-to-reel.
"June on the West Coast"
One reviewer said: "As a debut, the album is predictably raw and unpolished, with most of the tracks being strictly lo-fi affairs, ranging from scratchy, Dylan-esque song narrations to equally scratchy, upbeat emo (verging on screamo) numbers. Oberst's songwriting, both in terms of his lyrics and his abilities as a musician, were clearly still developing during the recording of Letting Off the Happiness, and frequently Oberst sounds like he's still figuring out what sort of artist he wants to be - charismatic folkster, disillusioned screamer or something else altogether?"
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Fever and Mirrors - 2000
After releasing a 6 song EP in 1999 (Every Day and Every Night, Oberst recorded Fever and Mirrors, a deeply personal record of a young song writer beginning to wrestle with his demons. The arrangements are more layered, with flutes, accordions and vibraphones added to the mix. Though it's another uneven affair, it shows Oberst at his most vulnerable.
"Haligh, Haligh, A Lie, Haligh"
A review: "Listening to Fevers and Mirrors is like walking in on people having sex; the act itself is intensely personal and beautiful but a third party feels deeply embarrassed to witness it. The album isn't a mirror at all, it's a window into Oberst's personality; he puts all of himself out there, even the parts that some might want to turn away from. "
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Lifted - 2002
Bright Eyes' 2002 release became the breakthrough album for the band. Despite recording together for over 5 years, Bright Eyes started popping up on several publications' "Best New Artist" lists. The album sold over 250,000 copies, making it the first commercial success for both Oberst and Saddle Creek Records.
The record doesn't stray too far from Oberst's lyrical themes of angst and depression, but the songs themselves are more mature, more fleshed out. The stand out track (to my ears), is "Don't Know When, But the Day is Gonna Come," which Pitchfork wrote, "hangs like a thundercloud in Western skies as Oberst talks of men with silver guns and dying for his father's sins. The cadence that unrolls and distant piano warbling sound like the first drops of rain that presage an eventual downpour, before the song finally breaks with a flood of strings and guitar. It brings to mind some of the darker moments of The Man in Black himself, Johnny Cash, with all its murmurings of end-times prophecies and sober grit-- and that's just about as high a compliment as I could pay. This track is definitely first among equals with the other great moments of Lifted."
Lifted... also saw Oberst start to break away from folk/acoustic arrangements and move back towards some of the electronic sounds he experimented with as a teenager. "Lover I Don't Have to Love," arguably the most popular tune from the record, is the most successful foray into this sound.
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I'm Wide Awake, It's Morning - 2005
Digital Ash in a Digital Urn - 2005
During the 2004 election season, Bright Eyes toured with Bruce Springsteen and R.E.M. on the Vote for Change tour, further pushing Bright Eyes into the public eye. Oberst sang numerous duets with the likes of Springsteen and Neil Young.
In November 2004, two Bright Eyes singles, "Lua" and "Take It Easy (Love Nothing)", reached the two top spots on the Billboard Hot 100 Single Sales. This was the first time this had happened on the list in seven years.
Though on it's surface, the release of two starkly different albums (the former a classic collection of alt country/americana tunes, the latter an album of electronica driven songs) comes off as a genre exercise, in reality it allowed Oberst to fully realize the two disparate sides of his songwriting personality.
I'm Wide Awake.... is the most country sounding record to date, adding layers of fiddle, mandolin, pedal steel and banjo to Oberst's acoustic arrangements. Three tracks feature Emmylou Harris on back vocals, and the lyrics turned away from Oberst's demons and towards social commentary. Songs like "Road to Joy", and "Landlocked Blues" throw jabs at the government:
So when you're asked to fight a war that's over nothing
It's best to join the side that's going to win
And no one knows how all of this got started
But we're gonna make goddamn certain, how it's gonna end
"Landlocked Blues"
The album's first single, "Lua", is one of the saddest songs about addiction I've ever heard:
The album opener, "At the Bottom of Everything," is classic Oberst; a catchy hook with biting lyrics:
Pitchfork says: "I'm Wide Awake perfectly captures a place and time in Oberst's life. It chronicles his first memories of staying in New York City, and the metropolis rarely gets a folk singer to chronicle its streets this lucidly, at least since the hootenanny days; he frequents its parties and stumbles down its streets like a midwestern transplant instead of a jaded hipster, sings about chemical dependency and the endless pains of love, while capturing as a backdrop the build-up to a foreign war. I'm Wide Awake weaves the personal and the political more fluidly than most singers even care to try, and the consummate tunefulness just strengthens those moments where he pinches a nerve-- the songs that still give me chills every time, like "At the Bottom of Everything": "Into the face of every criminal strapped firmly to a chair/ We must stare, we must stare, we must stare.""
The album ranked #8 on Rolling Stone's "best of 2005" list, as well as #50 on RS's "best of the decade" and #31 on NME's "best of the decade" lists.
Digital Ash in a Digital Urn is by far my LEAST favorite Bright Eyes record, as I far prefer the acoustic/organic style to the electronic. That said, it was a positive for Oberst, as he was able to fully realize his electronic leanings and "get it out of his system", so to speak. The album was reviewed far less favorably than it's companion, but still produced some memorable tunes.
"Easy / Lucky / Free"
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Cassadaga - 2007
In 2007, Oberst released The Four Winds EP, featuring the single off their upcoming album, plus five other songs (including a brilliant duet with M. Ward titled "Smoke Without Fire").
"Four Winds"
Cassadaga followed on the path set by I'm Wide Awake, It's Morning, giving catchy pop tunes an alt-country treatment. The arrangements are more robust, the songs more diverse, and, overall, the album shows Oberst at his most mature as a songwriter.
During a 7-night stint at The Town Hall in New York City, Bright Eyes welcomed the following guests on stage for special performances: Lou Reed on May 25; Ben Kweller on May 26; Jenny Lewis and Johnathan Rice on May 28; Norah Jones, Little Willie and Derrick E on May 29; Nick Zinner, Maria Taylor and Ben Gibbard on May 30, Steve Earle on May 31, and finally Ron Sexsmith and Britt Daniel on June 1
Pitchfork: "The orchestral work on old-fashioned ballad "Make a Plan to Love Me" never overburdens the song's pliant lilt, while the marching strings in the last verse of "Hot Knives", and the organs that eventually sweep in on the barren "No One Would Riot for Less", provide an acute sense of drama. They also allow Oberst to venture beyond his comfy trad-folk niche: Organic hand percussion, electric piano, and vibraphone bring a Middle Eastern influence to "Coat Check Dream Song" without crossing into caricature"
"Hot Knives"
"Middleman"
"No One Would Riot For Less"
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Conor Oberst - Conor Oberst - 2008
After touring Cassadaga, Oberst decided to put Bright Eyes on hiatus to focus on other projects. He released a self-titled solo album in 2008, recorded in Mexico with a new set of musicians (notably absent, fellow Bright Eye Mike Mogis). The result, while still classic Oberst, is more upbeat, less political. The record is mostly acoustic, though a few tracks "rock out". The song "Moab" was #38 on Rolling Stone's "best of 2008".
"Moab"
"NYC- Gone, Gone/Souled Out!"
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Outer South - Conor Oberst & the Mystic Valley Band - 2009
Oberst's second solo record (with the now "named" backing ground The Mystic Valley Band) was the first to feature songs written and sung by Oberst's bandmates. Nik Freitas, Taylor Hollingsworth and Jason Bossel contributed two songs each, giving the album a very diverse (if not altogether cohesive) sound. While the other contributions are interesting (and sometimes pretty good), it's Oberst's songs that shine here.
"Slowly (Oh So Slowly)"
"Ten Women"
"The Roosevelt Room"
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Monsters of Folk - 2009
After crossing paths many times on the road, Oberst and Mogis joined forces with frequent collaborator M. Ward and MMJ's Jim James to form Monsters of Folk. The group features songs by all four members of the group, with different members playing different instruments for each track.
Oberst's contributions included "A Man Named Truth", a song he had written a few years earlier (and debuted on stage with Dave Rawlings and Gillian Welch).
"Map of the World"
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The People's Key - 2011
In a June 2009 issue of Rolling Stone, Oberst announced that he wanted to "retire" the Bright Eyes moniker, and would be making one final album with the band: "It does feel like it needs to stop at some point. I'd like to clean it up, lock the door, say goodbye."
Conor Oberst has stated that the sound of The People's Key moves away from the folk sound that the band had accomplished on previous records. "We're over the Americana, rootsy, whatever that sound is. People say country but I never thought we were very country at all. But whatever that element is or that aesthetic is, I guess it's worn a little thin for me these days. So we very much wanted it to be rocking and, for lack of a better term, contemporary, or modern."
The record still feels like classic Oberst, but the arrangements are far more straight forward. Gone are the fiddles and lap steels, replaced with basic rock instrumentation (and a healthy dose of synth). In all honesty, it's a disappointing effort, especially since it has been 4 years since Cassadaga. If this is truly the end of Bright Eyes, I had hoped it would be with a better album.
That said, there are some very good songs here, including the haunting "The Ladder Song"
(possibly) their last appearance as Bright Eyes on Letterman (performing "JeJune Stars")
does that mean i have to shave