Bright Eyes: The People's Key

BRIGHT EYES: THE PEOPLE'S KEY (2011)

1) Firewall; 2) Shell Games; 3) Jejune Stars; 4) Approximate Sunlight; 5) Haile Selassie; 6) A Machine Spiritual; 7) Triple Spiral; 8) Beginner's Mind; 9) Ladder Song; 10) One For You, One For Me.

For three whole years, the world was free from the oppression of Bright Eyes, but not from Conor Oberst, who used the time to play around with several new projects: «Conor Oberst and the Mys­tic Valley Band» and «Monsters of Folk» among them. Then it was suddenly announced that, with one last album, Oberst would retire the «Bright Eyes» label completely. Accompanied with predictable commentary — that the brand name has outlasted itself, that it was time to move on, leaving the past behind etc.

Now I would be the last person in the world to expect a «grand exit»-style last album from Bright Eyes, but I do admit to a little anticipatory trepidation. What if Conor had decided to «pull all the stops»? Would that mean twelve-minute long howling ballads to the sound of a battered, out-of-tune acoustic guitar? Could that signify retreating into the safety of his bedroom, so as to make that hoarse, creaky, skipping lo-fi epic to put all lo-fi epics to shame? Might that imply using up all of the accumulated money to hire every single professional country musician in Nashville, so as to record the loudest ever version of ʽThat Silver-Haired Daddy Of Mineʼ, retitled as ʽThat Shiver-Sending Nightmare On My Mindʼ?

Wrong on all counts. The last album by Bright Eyes — if this is, indeed, the last album by Bright Eyes — is just a normal rock'n'roll album, much like Cassadaga was just a normal «nu-country» album. Other than a slightly above-ordinary emphasis on Rastafarian matters in the lyrics, and recurring bullshit voiceovers from some pretentious crackpot propagating pseudo-New-Age-non­sense about the «Superuniverse», The People's Key is just yer basic singer-songwriter's rock-a-pop. Quite restrained, concise, relatively harmless. Not too exciting — but not without an occa­sio­nal modest charm or two. Had this been my first Bright Eyes experience, I might have greeted it very warmly; as it is presumably my last one, I am almost tempted to regard it as a subtle apo­logy on Conor's part. «Hey guys, I guess I'm sorry for having bullshat you over all these years — here's a little something I cooked up for you that you might, perhaps, find more palatable».

These are all fully arranged, well fleshed out compositions, sometimes in the form of bombastic arena rock, sometimes bluesy, sometimes power-balladeerish, loaded with electronic vignettes, processed guitar effects, and prime time Oberstian lyrics, working overtime to avoid, stun, and disarm clichés and trivialities. From the subtly threatening blues-rock chords of ʽFirewallʼ that opens the album and right down to the sprawling, anthemic keyboards and funky percussion of ʽOne For You, One For Meʼ that closes it — The People's Key is beyond technical reproach.

Too bad I can no longer enjoy any of it. Honestly, some of these songs at least may rank as the best he's ever written — there are even shades of original catchy vocal melodies on ʽShell Ga­mesʼ, ʽLadder Songʼ, and a few others — but all of it leaves me cold, because the spirit of Bright Eyes remains exactly the same and cannot possibly change, since any radical change in Conor Oberst would ruin his game: sincerity has always been his biggest asset, and if he drops or even slightly shifts those pathetic-melancholic intonations — well, we will end up with a different Co­nor Oberst, and would that mean that the previous one has been insincere? Or the new one?..

Anyway, all of these songs are totally accessible, sensible, and probably as honest as anything the son of a bitch has ever written. They are not even as depressed and moronically suicidal as they used to be: a farewell should be farewell-ish, and most of the sadness here is consciously balan­ced with intelligent optimism — even as the lyrics of ʽOne For You, One For Meʼ seem to chastise huma­nity for its sliding away from the ideal of Oneness, its upbeat rhythmic pattern and (perhaps ironic) vocal enthusiasm disseminates a little hope, at least among those who cannot be bothered to study the words too closely. Besides, all these Rastafari references — how can a record like this be an exer­cise in total depression?

I guess I'm not entirely through with Oberst — there is still this bit of mystery as to how come I am so totally, utterly bored with an album like this, where nothing much irritates per se, other than the obnoxious guy chattering away about Einstein and Sumerian tablets. Somehow, all of these hooks, guitar and synth tones, vocal intonations, etc., still come across as totally bland; but it will take time to understand if it's really just the earlier anti-Oberst sentiment rising in vehe­ment bias here, or if the man is so genuinely and utterly devoid of talent when it comes to any­thing other than putting words on paper. In the meantime, my thumbs are frozen, and everybody is welcome to observe the purity of experiment and start his/her study of Bright Eyes with their last album — The People's Key, a title that should probably be better suited for the likes of Grand Funk Railroad or Hank Williams Jr., but somehow ended up used by a guy who is one of the least apt candidates for a true «people's artist» in the modern world. Oh, that Conor and his endlessly wasted stream of pointless irony.

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Bright Eyes: Cassadaga

BRIGHT EYES: CASSADAGA (2007)

1) Clairaudients (Kill Or Be Killed); 2) Four Winds; 3) If The Brakeman Turns My Way; 4) Hot Knives; 5) Make A Plan To Love Me; 6) Soul Singer In A Session Band; 7) Classic Cars; 8) Middleman; 9) Cleanse Song; 10) No One Would Riot For Less; 11) Coat Check Dream Song; 12) I Must Belong Somewhere; 13) Lime Tree.

Since I have pretty much exhausted my share of pejoratives to address the work of Conor Oberst, I will try to simply stick to the facts from now on. Cassadaga was released on April 10, 2007, on the Saddle Creek label. It has thirteen tracks, clocking in at slightly over 62 minutes. Mike Mogis produced the sessions, which altogether included over thirty different musicians — an absolute record for Bright Eyes, who would later return to a much smaller scale. The «real» album art was hidden from view, so that you could only see all the hidden messages (including a poorly done machine-version Russian translation of the phrase «draw another bloody bath») with the accom­panying «Spectral Decoder».

Sales were modest; critical acclaim — near universal, with the ar­guable exception of a lukewarm response from Pitchfork. Also, according to Wikipedia, Johnny Depp named Cassadaga one of his favorite things in 2007. Also, in 2007, Johnny Depp starred in Pirates Of The Caribbean: At World's End. So far, modern science has not conclusively disproven the lack of a logical con­nec­tion be­tween these two events, which, to a tiny degree, somewhat justifies my mentioning them in the same paragraph. And — just in case — be warned.

From top to bottom, Cassadaga consists of more or less traditionally-oriented songs: with the ex­ception of some atmospheric intros and outros that involve electronics, noises, and spoken vocals, most of it can be defined as relatively straightforward country-rock, usually with complex, multi-layered arrangements, with an acoustic guitar part at the core and from two to three to thirty extra musicians on top. This makes Cassadaga into the most accessible (for general audiences) album Oberst had released up to that date (not counting the Christmas record) — without electronics, lengthy solo acoustic confessionals, and with a much more restrained, balanced, some would say «mature» approach to singing, Cassadaga could easily be enjoyed by the grandfather and grand­son alike; a true piece of «family entertainment» if there ever was one — and I do insist that I am still sticking to the facts, for now.

In terms of melodies, we do not usually expect a lot of invention or originality from roots-rock albums that honor the old traditions, and expect them twice less if the creative force behind the roots-rock album is Conor Oberst. I did not get the impression of hearing even one melody that was not already familiar from somewhere, and there are quite straightforward reminiscences every now and then (ʽFour Windsʼ draws upon ʽThe Night They Drove Old Dixie Downʼ, and ʽMiddlemanʼ recogni­zably reinvents ʽHouse Of The Rising Sunʼ, to quote just two examples). As far as arrangements are concerned, they manage to keep some diversity by staying away from the «wall of sound» conception — despite all the layers, each song is usually defined by just one in­strumental type: fiddle on ʽFour Windsʼ, organ and piano on ʽIf The Brakeman Turns My Wayʼ, strings on ʽMake A Plan To Love Meʼ, woodwinds on ʽCleanse Songʼ, etc.

The lyrical journey of Oberst continues unimpeded as his words start making even less literal sense, and his allusions start getting more and more obscure, sometimes to the point where it does not seem like there are any allusions. Conor himself proclaimed that he did not want to include any «political» songs on the record, but not only that, very few of them — if any, in fact — deal with the old subject of «the end of the world through the eyes of a recently dumped loser». In their place, we have a solidified, nearly-finalized prophetic vision, perhaps best summarized in ʽFour Windsʼ: "And it's the sum of man, slouching towards Bethlehem / A heart just can't contain all of that empty space / It breaks, it breaks, it breaks".

It could be argued, in fact, that at this point Oberst's primary source of influence is The Band — and their «intellectualized» brand of roots-rock, pumping new wine into the old winebag. (Which, of course, begs for the question — exactly how many times can you fill an old winebag with new wine before it starts leaking on your boots? — but let's not forget about sticking to the facts). The big difference is that the spirit of The Band was more in line with the old folk idea of humble recognition of and submission to one's fate, whereas Oberst — on record, at least — is still a re­bel, and, of course, nobody in The Band would ever think of «offending» the Bible, and a song title like ʽI Must Belong Somewhereʼ is decidedly not «Bandish».

(For the record, I personally take significant offense not at the line "the Bible is blind, the Torah's deaf, the Qur'an is mute / If you burned them all together you'd be closer to the truth", but rather at the follow-up: "They're poring over Sanskrit under Ivy League moons while shadows lengthen in the sun". Really, Conor — empty ignorant hacks at abstract «bookishness» are so passé. Write me a letter if you are truly interested in how to poke fun at certain genuinely detrimental scientific practices of the day. Even better still, just write something nasty about Lady Gaga instead. Okay, back to the facts, the facts, the facts).

Actually, I have no more facts that would be useful for this here review, so let us just close it with a final flourish of completely subjective opinion, worthless from anybody else's perspective: I met exactly one song on this album that did not sound deadly boring. That was ʽMake A Plan To Love Meʼ, and I ascribe its success almost completely to the exquisitely arranged vocal harmo­nies of Stacy and Sherrie DuPree from the Texan band Eisley. As for everything else — I'd just as soon listen to Garth Brooks. Mush is mush, no matter if it consists of three or thirty-three lay­ers, and Cassadaga is mush supreme — but yes, it probably must take some talent to get thirty professional musicians to play on an album that does not leave even a passing impression. Final judgement? Why don't we all just share my thumbs down and go put on some Animals instead. Heck, I could even go for some Woody Guthrie — even though that guy never got thirty people to play on any of his records.

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Bright Eyes: Motion Sickness - Live Recordings

BRIGHT EYES: MOTION SICKNESS: LIVE RECORDINGS (2005)

1) At The Bottom Of Everything; 2) We Are Nowhere And It’s Now; 3) Old Soul Song; 4) Make War (short version); 5) Make War (long version); 6) Scale; 7) Landlocked Blues; 8) Method Acting; 9) Train Under Water; 10) When The President Talks To God; 11) Road To Joy; 12) Mushaboom; 13) True Blue; 14) Southern State; 15) The Biggest Lie.

A live album from Conor Oberst should not necessarily be unlistenable. After all, when playing before a real audience, he's got some options — for instance, be picky about his own track selec­tion, be inventive in rearranging formerly dull material, be unpredictable in the selection of co­vers, and, overall, try and be less «stuck up» than he is in the studio. How can one safely tell that he is not going to do and be all that prior to actually listening to the record? Perhaps Conor Oberst on stage is a completely different person. Perhaps he plays thrash metal guitar or something.

Of course, the track listing is a little suspicious. Although he had released two albums early that year, only the critically acclaimed Wide Awake is represented (and how — with six out of ten numbers getting the honors); Digital Ash is completely ignored, either because Conor didn't feel comfortable about translating the tape loops and digital beats into live reproductions, or because Robert Christ­gau, who once lovingly called Oberst «the poster boy of the American Agony Asso­ci­ation», was in the audience. (I'd rather bet on the latter.) Then there's a smaller bunch of songs from the equally acclaimed Lifted, a newly written anti-presidential rant, a cover of Feist, and a cover of Elliott Smith. Everything properly soulful, acoustic, and, for the most part, neo-country­ish without any serious reservations.

Alas, my individual «special» feelings about these tracks are mostly limited to disappointments (and getting «disappointed» in something Bright Eyes-related is a big disappointment indeed). On ʽLandlocked Bluesʼ, there is no Emmylou Harris; prepare to endure a thoroughly solo perfor­mance from the unhappiest man on the planet. The instrumental jam sections on ʽTrain Under Wa­terʼ are reduced to a cacophonous mess, with no traces of the sharp, well-rehearsed guitar so­los of the original. ʽWhen The President Talks To Godʼ is an atrocious bullshit rant that probably earned George W. Bush more supporters than enemies — tuneless, toneless, overwrought, with a mechanical heart on the sleeve pumping gallons of fake blood into the audience. (I used to think that no one could beat Ani DiFranco in the «Worst Anti-Establishment Rant From A Supposedly Intelligent Singer-Songwriter» game, but I'm not so sure any more). And the covers are deadly boring, although this should not discourage anyone from checking out Elliott Smith, Oberst's spi­ritual guru, who must have done many a spin in his grave over the past decade.

On the positive side... there's not much, really. The songs, good or bad, generally stick to the ori­ginal arrangements; there is even solid brass support from Nate Walcott on trumpet, who helps build up the appropriate rucus on ʽRoad To Joyʼ and elsewhere. There's a couple extra numbers that aren't available anywhere else, as far as I'm aware, but they are nothing special (big surprise). Well... maybe the most positive thing about it all is that it could have been even worse. At least there's no ʽWaste Of Paintʼ here, even if there might definitely be a «waste of plastic». Thumbs... nah, what do I really care.

Bright Eyes: Digital Ash In A Digital Urn

BRIGHT EYES: DIGITAL ASH IN A DIGITAL URN (2005)

1) Time Code; 2) Gold Mine Gutted; 3) Arc Of Time (Time Code); 4) Down In A Rabbit Hole; 5) Take It Easy (Love Nothing); 6) Hit The Switch; 7) I Believe In Symmetry; 8) Devil In The Details; 9) Ship In A Bottle; 10) Light Pollution; 11) Theme From Piñata; 12) Easy/Lucky/Free.

Of the two studio albums released simultaneously, Digital Ash seems to have received more critical flack and a little less fan respect, mainly because the word Digital in the title immediately focuses our attention on Conor's extensive use of electronics. I mean — yeah, what the hell, this is Bright Eyes and their frosty «Omaha sound», where the heck do synthesizers and programmed beats belong in this? And if this guy does so much to become the «icon of sincerity» in modern indie music, how does that agree with processing your music through a computer?

But that's all theory, and on practice, once you get past the nearly-instrumental intro of ʽTime Codeʼ, the use of electronics on this album is neither particularly annoying nor detracting from the «essence» of Bright Eyes. One thing Oberst is never very much interested in is making music, and that accounts for his approach to the electronic business as well. The programmed beats will hardly make Richard D. James lose much sleep, and the atmosphere-producing synthesizers pro­duce barely enough atmosphere for us to breathe it in, let alone any perspectives of intoxication.

Besides, most of the melodies remain in the usual neo-folk ballpark. No matter how many drum machine overlays there may be on ʽArc Of Timeʼ and how strongly the digital effects are pressed on its acoustic guitars, there is no force in the universe that could prevent me from wanting to fi­nish off the lines "...and they twist like sheets, till you fall asleep, and they finally unwind" with "...as we gaze upon the chimes of freedom flashing". You know what I mean: you can take a horse to the water, but you cannot make him bend a circuit.

On the other hand, bringing in electronics helps Oberst at least modestly expand his means and make a record more consistently listenable and less consistently predictable than things used to be. ʽGold Mine Guttedʼ is almost a good song — at least it has a simple, melancholic keyboard hook upon which Oberst's latest confessional can be appropriately hung. ʽDown In A Rabbit Holeʼ creates a wall of sound from various electronics and an entire string quartet. ʽTake It Easyʼ has a very pretty coda that joins martial rhythms with kiddie-magic electronic chimes. And so on and on — we are basically back to the complexity level of Fevers And Mirrors, and some of the bits and pieces here may even be more memorable.

As for the «attitudes» of particular songs, my brain exercises the old golden rule: the more suf­fering there is in an Oberst song, the more suffering is inflicted on the brain. Namely, that parti­cular part of Oberst that is responsible for ʽHit The Switchʼ and ʽDevil In The Detailsʼ, should be dragged out into the street and shot: lines like "sometimes I pray I don't die, I'm a goddamn hypo­crite", sung in that particular manner, make me want to cart him off at least as far as Somali or something like that. But less straightforward stuff like ʽShip In A Bottleʼ shows that he is just as capable of confessionalism without bad-actor overplay — and he is also capable of smarter-than-average social preaching on tunes like ʽLight Pollutionʼ.

Actually, somewhere around mid-album the electronic beats and loops almost disappear, and by the time we get to the end, the digital soldiers have mostly been assimilated by traditionally ori­ented guys, reduced to performing valuable background services. The best is saved for last: ʽEasy / Lucky / Freeʼ is an almost seductive combo of rhythmic loops, dreamy slide guitars à la Beach House, and well-arranged harmonies. As an anthemic coda, it has none of the questionable kitsch of ʽRoad To Joyʼ, never goes over the top, and delivers its condemnation of society's sins in an almost, dare I say it, mature kind of way.

Still, it is beyond my powers to clearly state that Digital Ash is a «thumbs up» sort of album. As with Fevers And Mirrors, I'd rather stay neutral about it, because, on the general scale of things, little has changed. Oberst's lyrics, bar a few blatant exceptions, get more complex and tempting for intellectual analysis, but they were never awful to begin with. His vocals here only make me want to throttle him a few times, but even when they don't, he still whines his way through with­out the slightest touch of humor and irony — and, for that matter, why the hell is he handling all the lead vocal duties himself again? And the melodies, for the most part, still suck: use of elec­tronics and this subtle gradual transition from «all-out digital» to «mostly analog» helps cope with that fact, but does not eliminate it.

Still, if faced with the necessity of choice, I would definitely take Digital Ash over Wide Awake, because I am afraid of Bright Eyes fans, and I know that for most of them, it is Oberst's bleeding hearted sincerity that serves as the major vitamin, so the more layers of sound this guy can use to muff and choke that sincerity, the more beats and loops he weaves into that bandage that causes the heart to bleed internally rather than externally, the safer I am. What sort of stupid jerk ever said that sincerity was im­portant in music, anyway? Oh, that's right, I did. But that was before I got acquainted with the Bright Eyes catalog, so don't be too hard on me.

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Bright Eyes: I'm Wide Awake, It's Morning

BRIGHT EYES: I'M WIDE AWAKE, IT'S MORNING (2005)

1) At The Bottom Of Everything; 2) We Are Nowhere And It's Now; 3) Old Soul Song (For The New World Order); 4) Lua; 5) Train Under Water; 6) First Day Of My Life; 7) Another Travelin' Song; 8) Landlocked Blues; 9) Poison Oak; 10) Road To Joy.

How difficult can it be for a young artist to record two full-length albums at the same time and re­lease them simultaneously? Maybe not too difficult if the artist in question does not bother to write any new melodies on either one. Why bother, indeed, if a bunch of anonymous hillbillies, Woody Guthrie, and Ludwig van Beethoven already did all the job for you. The good news is — none of them are going to show up and sue you when you least expect it.

Okay, that might have been a little harsh. But the really weird thing here is that it is I'm Wide Awake that got the most critical praise, rather than Digital Ash, and from a strictly musical point of view, there is no way that this could be justified — Digital Ash would be largely experimental and at least occasionally successful, whereas I'm Wide Awake sounds like it could have been re­corded in the heart of Nashville by a bunch of understudies awarded a couple of hours in one of the city's studios (the actual sessions all took place somewhere in Nebraska).

Yes, Emmylou Harris, whom I do respect a lot and whose talents and gifts I acknowledge quite gratefully, does contribute backing or dueting vocals on three of these tracks — this reflects Co­nor's odd, hypnotizing talent (one of the very few talents he does have) to attract celebrities to give his non-descript creations more «weight». It would have been much better, though, if he just handed all the vocal duties to her, or, for that matter, to Maria Taylor, who had already made that Christmas experience so much lovelier than one would expect — now, again, she is reduced to backups on just two of the songs. What's that he says on ʽLand Locked Bluesʼ? "If you love some­thing, give it away"? Well, how about giving away the right to sing lead, when there are all those lovely ladies around you, Conor?

Okay, seriously now. The music here is all generic country and folk, half of it arranged with the bare minimum of instruments (simple acoustic guitar, sometimes with a quiet rhythm section or an extra guitar part in the background), the other half getting the full country treatment — slide and steel guitars, harmonicas, a bit of keyboards, an occasional trumpet, the works. The only ex­ception to the genre rule is ʽRoad To Joyʼ, which takes the textbook part of Beethoven's 9th and turns it into a country tune, too, slowly building up the volume and aggression level towards the end. A meaningful musical joke? Maybe if it capped off an album of startling originality and in­ventiveness, I could say yes. As it is, I find that I cannot.

Of course, it's all in the attitude. But we already know the attitude, and the attitude hasn't changed much. As somebody who finds himself completely unable and unwilling to fall under the spell with which Conor Oberst frequently turns people into his personal slaves («Conor Oberst sends shivers down my spine, and I'm not afraid to admit it», quoth the Pitchfork review guy who gave this album an 8.7), I still find his lyrics creative and, perhaps, even getting craftier and craftier with each new record (a line like "the sun came up with no conclusions" is crafty, you'll have to admit it), but the way that he gets them out of his system is, at worst, very poor theater, and at best, a repulsive overstatement of his sincerity. This is not a Shakespearian universe. We're living in post-Dylan times, and if you can't cope with that, well, get yourself a time machine or some­thing. The combination of these simple-as-hell melodic skeletons with this atmosphere of pathos and cosmic suffering is unbearably ridiculous.

At least most of the tunes are relatively short (except for the worst ones, which are usually long because they crawl along at snailish tempos), consist of more than one chord, occasionally — ve­ry rarely — develop into mildly pleasant country jamming (ʽTrain Under Waterʼ is a damn fine sound for everyone who isn't completely alergic to country — that is, whenever Oberst shuts up and lets the instrumental players take over), and sporadically — even more rarely — come close to having a tiny bit of an original vocal hook (e. g. the "...yeah they go wild" bit on ʽOld Soul Songʼ, which, going against its title, is one of the most individualistic tunes on here).

Hence, I have no violent hate towards the record, nor would I care to propagate any. Maybe the cunning young lad from Omaha was right in using Emmylou Harris and Ludwig van as protec­tive talismans — their ex- and implicit presence, respectively, is what turns I'm Wide Awake from a middle-of-the-road modern country album into something that can get a rave review from Pitch­fork. But I would rather go along with the reknowned Stephen Thomas Erlewine of the AMG, who said this of Oberst: «Instead of reaching musical maturity, he's wallowing in a perpetual ado­lescence». Brilliantly said, mister, even if I disagree with your mainstreamish judgements some­thing like 70% of all the times. But here, you have entitled me to my next thumbs down.

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Bright Eyes: A Christmas Album

BRIGHT EYES: A CHRISTMAS ALBUM (2002)

1) Away In A Manger; 2) Blue Christmas; 3) Oh Little Town Of Bethlehem; 4) God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen; 5) The First Noel; 6) Little Drummer Boy; 7) White Christmas; 8) Silent Night; 9) Silver Bells; 10) Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas; 11) The Night Before Christmas.

My favorite Bright Eyes album ever, bar none. Not that I'd want to ever listen to it again, mind you, but there is one thing you cannot deny — no other Bright Eyes album has such a concentra­ted wallop of brilliant, hook-filled melodies over the course of a measly half-hour. ʽGod Rest Ye Merry Gentlemenʼ? Conor Oberst couldn't even begin to dream of writing such a brilliant tune. ʽWhite Christmasʼ? The entire Bright Eyes catalog is exchangeable for that one, and take half of Oma­ha's musical collectives as a free bonus. ʽThe Night Before Christmasʼ? Now that's what I call poetry, «you take all your smart modern writers», like Ray Davies said...

...okay, that's getting carried a bit too far, I admit. But seriously, as far as Christmas albums go, this one is no worse than most others, and as far as Bright Eyes albums go, I'd really rather have a Christmas album from these people than sixty minutes of their original «tunes». There is one ad­ded bonus: no matter how obnoxious and annoying Conor may seem in person (in «musical» per­son, I mean: in «real» person, I have no idea), he has this odd talent of attracting sympathetic fe­male performers, sometimes endowed with the prettiest of voices and nicest of attitudes. Here, his main partner is Alabama-born Maria Taylor, who plays some of the keyboards, sings about half of the songs (praise God!) and co-arranges most of them.

Production values remain targeted at the indie market — several tunes are defiantly lo-fi, some are defiantly underarranged, and almost everything is made to suffer from a mild form of «un-listen-abili-tosis» one way or another (including sprinklings of electronic noises, echo and other effects cast over traditional instruments, absurdly slowed down tempos, whatever). But that's just to make sure that, God forbid, any of your grandparents should unexpectedly take a liking to the album and start playing it instead of their Sinatra records.

Under that slightly scratchy surface, however, rests a perfectly normal Christmas album with very nice folksy crooning vocals from Taylor (ʽAway In A Mangerʼ, ʽWhite Christmasʼ), attempts on Conor's part to sing in a normal voice — yes, he does have one, and even though it can never be completely free of whiny overtones, they are actually quite in place on ʽBlue Christmasʼ, and even more so on ʽHave Yourself A Merry Little Christmasʼ (after all, you can't expect to ac­tually have someone sing this song to you in a merry mood and get away with it, can you?).

There is even some modestly successful experimentation here, like with ʽLittle Drummer Boyʼ, which they deconstruct by distorting every sound channel, and then punch up with some crunchy martial drumming to match the title; or with ʽSilent Nightʼ, where the vocals quickly disappear, giving way to a slow, supposedly-mesmerizing mix of dreamy country guitars with psychedelic effects. On the other hand, ending the album with a full recital of ʽTwas The Night Before Chris­t­masʼ, blandly performed by some grumbly guy against a minimalistic piano backdrop, is, at best, an anticlimactic idea — provided that one could expect a «climax» from an album like this in the first place, of course.

Clearly, the whole thing was little more than a killing-time project, or, perhaps, just a quick cash-in on Conor's growing popularity — generous cash-in, since the proceeds of the album have been said to go to the «Nebraska AIDS Project» — but I was genuinely surprised at how much of the repulsive side of Bright Eyes was cut off here, while still leaving some of Oberst's typical, and least annoying, trademarks; and I am a bit puzzled at the frequently violent rejection of the record encountered among the fans. Yes, it is a «generic Christmas album», but hey, if you take Oberst as your guru, you have to try and put some sense into it anyway; and if you do not take Oberst as your guru, it's all the more nice to realize he's finally made an album where he isn't trying to teach you something. In the general line of things, it is quickly forgettable; in the overall context of Bright Eyes' history, it works better than I could have imagined.

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Bright Eyes: Lifted

BRIGHT EYES: LIFTED OR THE STORY IS IN THE SOIL, KEEP YOUR EAR TO THE GROUND (2002)

1) Big Picture; 2) Method Acting; 3) False Advertising; 4) You Will. You? Will. You? Will; 5) Lover I Don't Have To Love; 6) Bowl Of Oranges; 7) Don't Know When But A Day Is Gonna Come; 8) Nothing Gets Crossed Out; 9) Make War; 10) Waste Of Paint; 11) From A Balance Beam; 12) Laura Laurent; 13) Let's Not Shit Ourselves (To Love And To Be Loved).

«Why is he suffering so much?» my wife asked me during the last minutes of ʽWaste Of Paintʼ, which I, for some mysterious reasons, was listening to without the headphones. «Did his girl­friend die or anything?» That was the moment when I understood that that was it, that the Bright Eyes were finished for me — because this was the first time ever that I was asked that question. Syd Barrett, Neil Young, Robert Smith, Peter Gabriel, and even Badly Drawn Boy — all of them survived in the end, but the fate of Conor Oberst was sealed, once and for all. It sort of snapped me out of that oozy, dreamy state where I was... well, not exactly ready to fall under this guy's charm, but at least sort of accept his whinery as a given fact of life. Like, some people yell and other people whine, and then there should be tolerance and all.

But no, really. On this album, which could have easily been called Lifted, but one-word album titles are for laconic sissies, Conor puts the wheel in reverse and, for the most part, dispenses with the intricate arrangements of Fevers And Mirrors, with just a few notable exceptions that will be noted later. On such minimalistic, but bleeding long acoustic rants as ʽBig Pictureʼ and ʽWaste Of Paintʼ, he seems to be trying to earn his «modern day Dylan» reputation, except that Dylan al­ways took better care of his guitar accompaniment and never ripped as many shirts along the way. At the very least, ʽBig Pictureʼ justifies its title by no longer being exclusively tied to some sort of «woman trouble» — it's a well-made declaration of personal and artistic freedom, but really, Conor, there is no need to impersonate a tortured, mutilated revolutionary being led to the guillo­tine. You're only 22 years old, everything will work out. Maybe you ought to move to North Ko­rea for a couple of years, it'll do you good.

When the «songs» reluctantly agree to be more than just a couple of acoustic chords, they still tend to just roll along doing nothing, like the «grand» ten-minute conclusion of ʽLet's Not Shit Ourselvesʼ. Maybe it is Oberst's ʽDesolation Rowʼ, but even ʽDesolation Rowʼ had a nifty acous­tic riff running through it; here, the «music»'s only purpose is to provide Oberst's grand anti-esta­b­lishment rant with a toe-tapping beat. Sincerity? Who gives a damn about sincerity when noth­ing about your sincerity makes it any more attractive than anyone else's sincerity? Or was there no one else in 2002 brave enough to let The Truth out, other than Conor Oberst? The most annoy­ing thing about these «soulful» deliveries is that they are delivered as if the man was a fuckin' Cassandra — completely alone in a world of deaf and dumb people. (Well, I don't know, maybe in Omaha... but nah, not really).

The only substantial musical idea on the entire album may be found on ʽDon't Know Whenʼ, where most of the verses are sung to a simple folk-dirge melody with a simple, but effective chord progression. In a way, it almost works like a mantra, and if only Oberst did not eventually succumb to the temptation of ripping one more shirt and self-exploding in a fit of drunken ire, it could almost become seductive — but this guy is under a firm conviction that «sincerity» and «perfec­tionism» are mortal enemies, and in their endless struggle he knows only too well whose side he will take.

Of course, there are still quite a few numbers featuring complex arrangements — no surprise here, since a mind-boggling twenty-five musicians altogether were involved in the making of the album, making it a serious contender for «hugest waste of talent ever». Well, not all of these musicians are equally talented, I guess, but on such tracks as ʽLover I Don't Have To Loveʼ or ʽFrom A Ba­lance Beamʼ the keyboards and strings work very well, as before, trying to dress the man's non-descript compositions in shiny technicolor robes. On others, like ʽMake Warʼ, they are going for a «lo-fi country» approach, with slide guitars and harmonicas at the ready. To no avail.

Not that you should take my opinion: Rolling Stone itself rated Lifted as the fourth greatest al­bum of 2002, and even The Dean himself, Mr. Robert "I Dare You To Fill In The Blanks In My Opinions, Punk" Christgau invited us all to "feel or indulge his suffering youth" and be awarded with awe. Maybe for all these guys, the weaving techniques of Mr. Oberst really work. Or maybe they were simply so hungry for «genuine rough-cut emotion» after all those years of post-modern cynicism that even Conor Oberst would do. It might not be a coincidence, really, that the Bright Eyes' ratings seriously plummeted with the emergence of Arcade Fire — as far as I'm concerned, when you got Win Butler, the need to have Conor Oberst dissipates in a flash. Thumbs down, anyway: the few decent arrangements that we have here cannot compensate for at least a half hour's worth of total abomination.

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Bright Eyes: Fevers And Mirrors

BRIGHT EYES: FEVERS AND MIRRORS (2000)

1) A Spindle, A Darkness, A Fever And A Necklace; 2) A Scale, A Mirror And Those Indifferent Clocks; 3) The Calendar Hung Itself; 4) Something Vague; 5) The Movement Of A Hand; 6) Arienette; 7) When The Curious Girl Realizes She Is Under Glass; 8) Haligh, Haligh, A Lie, Haligh; 9) The Center Of The World; 10) Sunrise, Sunset; 11) An Attempt To Tip The Scales; 12) A Song To Pass The Time.

Critic alert! For the first time in Bright Eyes history, Conor Oberst is trying to apply his (lack of) musical talent to the craft of writing and recording actual music. What used to be, only recently, just rudimentary acoustic guitar patterns, is getting seriously expanded: no less than ten different musicians are involved in the project now, and the mysterious «Omaha sound» is gradually be­coming decloaked. Now it basically means: «play the same simple shit, but dress it up in as many musical layers as possible to make up for the lack of interesting chord progressions».

For instance, already on the second track we have this little chamber piece where Conor is play­ing an organ, perennial partner Mike Mogis is bowing a pedal steel, Jiha Lee is fiddling with the flute, and A. J. Mogis is punching the piano — all at the same time, imagine that! Almost enough to make you forget that the music is just a simple country waltz, and that all of the parts supplied by the extra musicians are rather predictable flourishes that bake up the mood in strict accordance with traditional old recipés. One impressive musical hook, just one, could have saved the situati­on, but we are not going to get so lucky.

The good news is that, although Oberst still has a long way to go towards mastering the art of songwriting, Fevers And Mirrors is nowhere near as irritating in its misery as Oberst’s early es­capades, mainly because he is trying to find a more accessible voice for himself, without losing the individuality. Now most of the wailings are produced with a «bleating» tone — more quiet, more frail, less intrusive. If there is an infectious patient running around town and scattering his bacteria in everybody’s direction, after all, everybody’s only immediate concern will be to get the sick guy back into bed. On Fevers And Mirrors, the sick guy grudgingly does return to bed, and stays there most of the time, blearily contemplating his fevers in his mirrors.

He does still attempt to make a few escapades — like on ʽThe Calendar Hung Itselfʼ, whose prime point of attraction is a little foam-at-the-mouth hysteria staged around a «mad» chanting of ʽYou Are My Sunshineʼ that is supposed to reflect the protagonist’s suicidal desperation (she’s gone, you know, and this is sufficient ground for behaving like an ugly spoiled teenager, unfor­tunately suffering from a little bit of poetic gift, etc. etc.). As unbearably pretentious as that mo­ment is, it is at least a moment that kind of stays with you, so there must have been something to the idea, if only it were realized better.

Everything that comes afterwards mostly follows the same formula. Slow, steady, rhythmic backgrounds with a rootsy backbone, «graced» by various instrumentation that is not usually as­so­ciated with «rootsy» — vibraphones, Mellotrons, flutes, various «treated» guitars and key­boards, etc. — in addition to the predictable stuff like pedal steel and accordeons. No matter how intricate the arrangements are, though, nothing sticks around for too long, and everything seems to be merely a comfy setting for Oberst’s lyrical floodwaves.

Realising, perhaps, that the floodwaves might eventually flood the listener’s patience, Oberst takes a little jab at himself with the aptly titled ʽAn Attempt To Tip The Scalesʼ — a song that disappears rather quickly, in order to make way for a staged «interview» between an announcer and a guy impersonating Oberst himself, so thoroughly full of himself (and it) that it is impos­sible to take any of those replicas seriously. The uncomfortable feeling is that the impersonator is not so much trying to impersonate the real Oberst, as he is trying to capture the spirit of vintage Bob Dylan interviews (the ones in which Bob would turn the interviewer’s boring questions back at the interviewer himself), but without a firm hold on Bob’s complexity or humor.

Humor is ac­tually the key element here: if the real Dylan ever tried to befuddle an interviewer by saying “I do have a brother who drowned in a bathtub... actually, I had five brothers who died that way. My mother drowned one every year for five consecutive years. They were all named Padraic, so they all got one song”, it would be in firm keeping with his regular artistic persona, for whom humor, all kinds of it, was an integral part. But nothing about Oberst is ever funny — and so this attempt to have a little «forced laugh» at the expense of his alter ego does not succeed. It certainly breaks up the predictability of the flow, but I wouldn’t put it down as a healthy con­tribution to the «Artistic Reputation Improvement Fund».

If you really, really want to make yourself like Bright Eyes, try ʽMovement Of A Handʼ. Oberst is easier to tolerate when he puts away at least a small part of his self-pitying (although this hap­pens very rarely), and on this particular track, the Rhodes piano / dulcimer / Mellotron arrange­ment plus Jiha Lee’s backing vocals — ever so often, Oberst’s only salvation comes from a nice girl who can sing better than he does — create a mood that is so sympathetic, I could even find it «enchanting» on a particularly auspicious day. Yet this is only an exception; already on ʽArie­netteʼ, the guy is back to his cosmic misery.

Lyrically, I do not see any positive or negative growth. There are so many words here, such an endless sea of metaphors both boring and startling that we could spend years dissecting them, but I am really reluctant to discuss lyrics whose only underlying subject had already long ago been sufficiently well covered by John Lennon in just one phrase: “If I were you, I’d realize that I love you more than any other guy”. If you are eighteen years old, relatively straight (it’s a big question whether Conor Oberst has any appeal for gay audiences), and have psychological troubles adap­ting to the opposite sex, these songs may have a consoling message for you (at least you’ll know that you are not alone). Go one step further and that’s it. This ain’t a case of «Romeo and Juliet», really, it’s a case of masochistically picking at a small paper cut to see if you can get it to inflame — nothing like a nice little gangrene to keep one’s spirit healthy.

The only reason why I don’t give the album an overall negative assessment is because it is really «neutral» rather than overtly «negative». Behind all the nicely planned multi-layered arrange­ments Oberst’s angst and personal apocalypse does not hit as hard on the nerves, so the album just goes by, unfelt, unnoticed, but inspiring a little hope that this could be the beginning of real musi­cal growth. A little, but not too much — Conor Oberst is clearly not going to sacrifice his rich inner universe for the sakes of writing stupid antiquated things like «original melodies».

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Bright Eyes: Letting Off The Happiness

BRIGHT EYES: LETTING OFF THE HAPPINESS (1998)

1) If Winter Ends; 2) Padraic My Prince; 3) Contrast And Compare; 4) The City Has Sex; 5) The Difference In The Shades; 6) Touch; 7) June On The West Coast; 8) Pull My Hair; 9) A Poetic Retelling Of An Unfortunate Seduction; 10) Tereza And Tomas.

On his «proper» debut for Saddle Creek Records, allegedly written and recorded as a cohesive LP, Conor Oberst is apparently still «seemingly incapable of penning a bad tune», meaning that the album is only marginally more listenable than A Collection Of Songs. The best I can say is that, this time around, it at least does sound like «a collection of songs» (mostly bad ones), rather than «a collection of sketches that most 12-to-15-year-olds usually stuff under their beds». Thus, if there is any reason to call «Bright Eyes» an actual band, the reason might as well start here.

The first two songs will probably be enough to determine everybody's feelings. I find them totally unlistenable — interesting melodic input amounts to zero and then falls below, and the singing... well, keep in mind that this is still slightly before Oberst found his trademark «tremolo ble­a­ting» manner; here, he still seems to be going for the «drunk soulful hipster» approach, one of the most infernal images known to mankind.

"And I give myself three days to feel better / Or else I swear I'm driving off a fucking cliff", he blurts out in the opening number. Since the album has been praised so much for the «sincerity» of its emotions, I can only assume that three days after recording the song, Oberst did feel better. The question is — once he did, why the heck didn't he throw away all of these recordings and replace them with something more worthwhile? Some people, when they feel bad, should proba­bly keep away from the studio, especially if they cannot stay focused on anything other than feel­ing bad. Millions of people all over the world are feeling bad at the exact moment that I'm typing this. Heck, I'm not feeling too good myself. But even so, I'd rather go and just bang my head against the wall than sympathize with the plight of one Mr. Oberst from Omaha, Nebraska, who, at the tender age of 18, seems to be more pissed off at life than Dr. Faust in his twilight years — most of it because he doesn't seem to be able to get it on with chicks. (On the other hand, at least he is being honest about it: "And I fell for the promise of a life with a purpose / But I know that's impossible now" is quickly followed by "...because I just can't think anymore about that or about her tonight". Yes, we do know that in most of these cases it is a she that is responsible for most of the problems, not an impersonal metaphysical transcendental it.) Aw come on now, Conor, chicks are trash, just get over it and find your future in furniture polishing. Or speleology.

About a third of the «songs» is just Oberst with his broken-hearted raspy screaming; on the other tunes, he is joined by some of his compadres on drums, bass, electric guitars, and poorly tuned or downright broken electronic instruments. Everything is conventionally lo-fi, stumbling, unrehear­sed, and, for the most part, melodically primitive. Deadly slow, too, meaning that the only fast-paced song on the album, ʽThe City Has Sexʼ, will pass off as a highlight by definition — for its frenzied, but still underworked, country-rock arrangement, and its title, which is pronounced far more completely in the opening line: "The city has sex with itself, I suppose". The last verse of the tune is quite telling as well: "And I scream, but I still don't know why I do it / Because the sound never stays, it just swells and decays / So what is the point? / Why try to fight what is now so certain? / The truth is all that I am is a passing event that will be forgotten". Yes, yes, YES! Listen to Mr. Oberst speak the truth about himself.

There is exactly one track on the entire album that I found myself caring about — ʽContrast And Compareʼ, a duet with Neely Jenkins who's got the sweetest voice ever; this creates a sort of beau­ty-and-the-beast effect on the tune that works much better on the nerves, and it is only too bad that Oberst did not make more use of this contrast on the other songs as well. By all means, ʽTereza And Tomasʼ, a song that is supposed to bring a relatively peaceful and romantic end to the album, could have benefited from Neely's contribution — if Oberst cannot sing, this does not necessarily mean that every Bright Eyes song is unfit for a real singer.

Overall, I can only repeat what I have already said a million times about modern bands. To sing about the literal or figurative End Of The World when you are 15 or even 18 years old is a ridi­culous occupation, unless you have at least won the Nobel Prize when you were 12. To sing about the End Of The World when you are 18 years old and cannot sing — or play — or come up with a unique sound — or write interesting, memorable melodies — or get professional musicians to do all these things for you — or compensate for the lack of everything with at least something that goes beyond «hmm, decent enough lyrics for a teenager» — is simply abysmal. Thumbs down all the way to the floor; I see no reason why, on any objective or subjective scale, this crap should be preferable to Justin Bieber.

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Bright Eyes: A Collection Of Songs Recorded 1995-1997

BRIGHT EYES: A COLLECTION OF SONGS RECORDED 1995-1997 (1998)

1) The Invisible Gardener; 2) Patient Hope In New Snow; 3) Saturday As Usual; 4) Falling Out Of Love At This Volume; 5) Exaltation On A Cool, Kitchen Floor; 6) The Awful Sweetness Of Escaping Sweat; 7) Puella Quam Amo Est Pulchra; 8) Driving Fast Through A Big City At Night; 9) How Many Lights Do You See; 10) I Watched You Taking Off; 11) A Celebration Upon Completion; 12) Emily, Sing Something Sweet; 13) All Of The Truth; 14) One Straw (Please); 15) Lila; 16) A Few Minutes On Friday; 17) Supriya; 18) Solid Jackson; 19) Feb. 15th; 20) The 'Feel Good' Revolution.

In the Golden Age of Music, when the grass was green, cheap, and promoted by Steppenwolf, and the «indie kids» did not draw their power out of the very fact of being pigeonholed, every once in a while there would arise a Poet, capable of stringing together exciting combinations of words, but completely helpless when it came to setting these words to music. And every once in a while he would decide to set those words to music anyway — perhaps because it helped the Poet to reach out to a wider audience, or maybe just because the Poet thought that some sort of non-human accompaniment was required to complete the message.

What would the Poet do, then? Most often, he would take a simple, familiar, folk-tradition-san­ctified theme, and adapt the lyrics to it — never pretending to any musical breakthroughs, just getting himself a well-oiled musical launchpad for his charismatic individuality (or for his annoy­ing egomaniacality, whichever way you'd like to call it). Think Leonard Cohen or someone of his ilk, and there you'd have it — nobody in his right mind would call Cohen a great musician or composer, although he is definitely much more than just a «lyricist».

But times have changed since then, and now here comes Conor Oberst, an aspiring young singer-songwriter from Omaha, Nebraska, whose creative streak begins around 1992, when he was just a measly 13 years old. Young Conor Oberst has a poetic gift — one might love his creations, or hate them, but it is undeniable that not everyone can write at 20, 30, or 90 like Mr. Oberst could at 15. Problematically, Mr. Oberst does not have any other gifts: I would not go as far as to sug­gest that Mr. Oberst is «tonedeaf», but that is one of the options, even if the critics rarely dare to mention it (why face a potential slander suit from someone who provides you with your daily bread?). At the very least, Mr. Oberst is practically incapable of writing a «song» in the most ba­nal understanding of the term — and I insist on «incapable», not on «unwilling».

Be it in 1967, Mr. Oberst could, perhaps, follow the Cohen route, and set his poetic musings to simple adaptations of and simpler variations on the great musical legacy of thousands of nameless folk heroes of the Old and New Worlds combined. But in the mid-1990s, such an approach would be considered obsolete, uncool, and undeserving of a young, ambitious, expressive, and, above all, brutally HONEST and anti-commercial artist. Above all, «indie aesthetics» requires honesty be­fore the listener; throw on some serious poetic talent, and what else do you really need?

Nothing, really, and that is why there is nothing else on Conor Oberst's debut album for his gran­dest project, the one-man band Bright Eyes. Well, other than a battered, frequently out of tune acoustic guitar, occasional rudimentary electronics / drum machines, some cheap recording equi­p­ment, and probably a bedroom. (A few of Conor's friends, mostly amateur musicians from Oma­ha, some of whom also played in his earlier «band», Commander Venus, guest on a tiny handful of these tracks, but something like eighty percent of the time it's just The Creative Young Man on his solitary own). In a different world, an album like this would have been laughed off the bat — imagine putting on Please Please Me and hearing a Cavern Club-quality recording of ʽI Lost My Little Girlʼ and ʽIn Spite Of All The Dangerʼ instead of ʽI Saw Her Standing Thereʼ. But in this mad, mad, mad, mad world we happen to live in, A Collection Of Songs actually managed to garner some positive reactions — even some reviewers who obviously did not like it still found it necessary to write something like: «Even at a young age, it's clear that Oberst is an extremely ta­lented songwriter, seemingly incapable of penning a bad tune...». Thus quoth Nathan Bush of the All-Music Guide; then, having realized what he has just done one second too late, reluctant to de-quoth himself, he heads straight for the back door — «...(except in the odd case when you sense he didn't try)». Nice try, Mr. Bush of the All-Music Guide!

Unfortunately, as far as my ear is concerned, this whole record consists of nothing but «odd ca­ses», arguably making it one of the oddest albums ever released. ʽThe Invisible Gardenerʼ un­locks the experience with a swift electronic burst, as if you are about to be sent into outer space; three seconds later, the tape recorder clicks, a simple acoustic accompaniment pattern is given a false start, and then it comes again, this time accompanied with an equally trivial «electronic har­monium» pattern. Two and a half minutes later, you might want to ask yourself: «Say! Isn't that just the kind of music-making you'd expect to hear from any fifteen-year old with a tape recorder and a tiny bit of musical education? What strange chain of events has led me into sitting here and listening to this, when I could be saving the world from cancer or dubstep instead?»

But two and a half minutes later also comes the first vocal number, and it provides a response. The lyrics aren't exactly jaw-dropping, but they are fairly respectable for someone who wrote them at the age of 15 or 16: not too overloaded with fashionable clichés and «intellectual meta­phors», not overtly romantic, melancholic, or suicidal — and not dumb, either. At any rate, I do not feel too irritated by this wordy stuff as long as I remember the age of the writer. ʽPatient Hope In New Showʼ is basically an ʽI Want To Hold Your Handʼ in a world that has long outgrown 1963, and now we have "and for a moment I could want nothing, your bright eyes burn through my exploding heart" instead.

Where I do feel irritated is the delivery department. Conor Oberst would learn to get better as the years went by, but here it almost seems as if he is struggling with puberty before our very eyes: almost everything comes out in a tuneless, strained, grating rasp, occasionally rising to a wild howl without losing the rasp. Try howling and rasping at the same time — see how long it is be­fore they put you in a straightjacket, and this guy managed to avoid the people in white long enough to record an hour's worth of this cr... er, I mean, «quintessence of honesty».

There is no need to discuss the individual «songs», because most of these creations are not really «songs» — they are nearly formless, only vaguely outlined demo-level sketches. ʽFalling Out Of Love At This Volumeʼ stands out by being faster and more rhythmic than the rest, with faint hints at a guitar hook and an attitude reminiscent of early Cars (ʽJust What I Neededʼ, etc.); and ʽOne Straw (Please)ʼ features real drums and a basic pop-rock swagger. The rest all seem to have been made on the spot, with Conor dragging out his notebooks and just setting the words to whatever sequences of freshly learned chords came along.

Now the thing is, I do not believe that this young gentleman has any real musical talent, but nei­ther, after all, did Leonard Cohen, and it is possible sometimes to get by on the strength of atti­tude alone, or workmanship and craft alone, or a combination of both. But these raw sketches do not have enough attitude: every time Conor tries to sing in a «normal» voice / whisper, it just comes out «normal» — and boring — and every time he begins rasping and howling, the whole experience just becomes unbearable. As for «workmanship»... well, I do not think even the man himself would be able to or wanting to defend the record as a «solid» offering.

Sure, in a way, it takes GUTS to introduce yourself to the world with your early jottings instead of saving them up for a twenty-years-later archival release, targeted at armies of fans. But with the indie aesthetics in full flight, and with the whole lo-fi craze, and with the general easiness of releasing anything these days (even if these particular days still predated Myspace), in 1998 this kind of move was not that gutsy — fact is, no matter what sort of shit you release, as long as it agrees with certain trends of the day, you will always end up with at least a minor fanbase. Thus, I fail to appreciate the gesture.

Maybe the best thing is to just download the lyrics — as I said, they are damn good for their «age group», and it is always a gas to find a title rendered in proper Latin (ʽPuella Quam Amo Est Pulchraʼ), even if it seems to have been taken from an elementary textbook of the language rather than from Catullus, to whose laurels Conor Oberst may be secretly aspiring. Also, as a sidenote, there is really something eerie about the way in which Oberst howls out "Emily, sing something sweet for me" — maybe they did put him in a straightjacket, after all. But overall, this is a certi­fied thumbs down if there ever was one.

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