We love you, Conor

I am training to be a journalist, which pretty much means forgetting everything you were ever taught in English lessons at school or college. And leaving behind any temptation to use long sentences or remotely elaborate adjectives.

Anyway, that doesn't have any relevance to anything. Except that this blog will henceforth forthwith be my haven for creative scripture.

I have rediscovered a lost album, as is my wont. I'm sure I've blogged about them before, but for the benefit of anyone who doesn't know already, Bright Eyes is a band consisting of singer-songwriter/guitarist Conor Oberst, multi-instrumentalist/producer Mike Mogis, Nate Walcott, and a rotating lineup of collaborators drawn primarily from Omaha's indie music scene.

In 2002 they released their 5th studio album, entitled 'Lifted or The Story is in the Soil, Keep Your Ear to the Ground'. It's a brilliant, multi-layered, raw piece of work, much less produced and polished than their recent material. I first heard it on vinyl and it really works in that format. Oberst often sounds like he was meant for another era. I am fascinated by the guy, mainly because of his music but also because of his childhood and his passionate anti-war protest songs, a genre he seems to share with only Neil Young and Bruce Springsteen these days. See the hoarse-throated 'Road to Joy' from 'I'm Wide Awake It's Morning' -

'If you're going to fight a war that's over nothing, make sure you join the side that's going to win / No-one's sure how all of this got started, but we're gonna make them goddamn certain how it's gonna end'

Anyway, here are a couple of tracks from 'Lifted...':

Bright Eyes: Nothing Gets Crossed Out

Bright Eyes: False Advertising

and a blistering performance of 'Road to Joy' on Craig Ferguson, followed by an incredibly cringeworthy interview:



Why do they keep cheering everything he says? Stupid Americans.