everhart541(at)hotmail(dot)com
FEATURED INTERVIEWS
Sonic Youth, 2009
Grizzly Bear, 2009
Yo La Tengo, 2009
Michael Stipe, 2008
Stephen Malkmus, 2008
Conor Oberst, 2007
The Long Blondes, 2006
FEATURED REVIEWS
Stephen Malkmus & the Jicks, 2008
Beach House, 2008
The Clientele, 2007
Frida Hyvönen, 2006
Ladybug Transistor, 2006
Hidden Cameras, 2006
Why He's Staying Here
+ Big Takeover magazine, Spring 2007 +
Conor Oberst initially burst on the indie scene in the late nineties as a polarizing cult figure from the dark fringes of Omaha, NE. With his frazzled chamber-folk band Bright Eyes, he captivated legions of devotees with the sheer poetic clarity and vulnerability with which he expressed the most banal of emotions, and simultaneously alienated others with his bleating, angst ridden delivery. Barely twenty, he fashioned a rough musical equivalent of The Unbearable Lightness of Being on the harrowingly raw Fevers and Mirrors, vividly capturing the messy imagination of youth with abject fervor.
Then Bush and his cadre of neocon monsters took over in 2001, and Oberst’s songwriting took a pronounced turn, beginning with an audacious foray into slash and burn punk rock with side band Desaparecidos, which assumed a Fugazi-like visceral catharsis, filtered through the socio-political ideals of Noam Chomsky. The ideology of the project surely informed Bright Eyes’ 2002 breakthrough Lifted, a cataclysmic mess of a chamber pop record rife with political invective, and carried over onto the group’s watershed dual release of the semi-electronic Digital Ash in a Digital Urn and the torch-folk oriented I’m Wide Awake It’s Morning in 2005. Both were superb, but the latter was Oberst’s most consistent work yet, his best synthesis to date of the intensely personal yet deeply political.
The remarkable progression continues on Cassadaga, which is more elliptical and less cohesive than its predecessors, yet no less compelling or challenging. Oberst is now in his late twenties, and has mitigated the histrionics of yore, but his spitfire passion remains, as he fitfully navigates a treacherous political and musical vortex without a compass.
Cassadaga possesses a rough-hewn Flying Burrito Brothers country vibe that’s also heavy on dense, Spector-like orchestration, well illustrated in the eerie cacophony of opener “Clairaudients (Kill Or Be Killed).” The incendiary first single “Four Winds” is replete with dirty fiddle and Blood on the Tracks-like Hammond organ, finding Oberst waxing post-apocalyptically of “Great Satan” and “The Whore of Babylon.”
And “Everything Must Belong Somewhere” is perhaps Oberst’s finest moment yet, a plaintive sing-song framed by shuffling acoustics and resplendent pedal steel, as he laments with dignified resignation, “Leave the hot bright trash in the shopping malls/Leave the hawks of war in their capitals/Let the organ’s moan in the cathedral remain/Because everything it must belong somewhere.”
Thanks to Bright Eyes’ manager and Team Love label head Nate Krenkel for hosting the interview at his East Village office/apartment.
JE: I know you went into other records with pre-conceived ideas, especially on Lifted and I’m Wide Awake It’s Morning and Digital Ash in a Digital Urn. Did you have a plan going into this one?
CONOR: Not really. We just wanted to take as much time as we felt we needed and record a lot of songs and let the album materialize on its own. We really wanted to just be open and follow each of the songs to their conclusion and see what kind of common thread there was.
JE: And what did you see as far as common threads go? This one seems more disjointed than the last few.
CONOR: Well, I think the songs fit together in a way that I understand. I don’t know if I can articulate exactly what it is in a word, but I hope people get it.
JE: It isn’t as accessible as the last two on the first few listens.
CONOR: I like records that reward you after repeated listens, with just more information or things you maybe didn’t notice, if it’s the arrangements or the lyrics, if once you peel back the layers it’s enjoyable for more than a few listens.
JE: Can you talk about the string arrangements on the record?
CONOR: Nate Walcott wrote all the arrangements for the strings and woodwinds, he was a big part of that sound. It was exciting to record with a full orchestra (recorded in Hollywood at Capitol Studios), all 40 some people in the room together. It’s really cool.
JE: How did that differ from Lifted’s string arrangements?
CONOR: They were on a much smaller scale. There was more multi tracking, overdubbing, trying to create this big sound in the studio, while this was more natural, like, just put the mics there and have them play.
JE: How did you end up working with Janet Weiss (Sleater-Kinney/Quasi)?
CONOR: I met her several years ago, just through friends. I get along with her really well as a person, and always talked about recording or touring together. I was out in Portland, The impetus for that was working with Matt Ward. It worked out that Janet was in between things and had time to do it. And getting to play with her, found out that musically we get along as well as we do personally.
JE: And Matt Ward, you’ve been collaborating with him for quite some time.
CONOR: Matt Ward sings some, plays some guitar on the record. We became friends in 2001. He’s one of my favorite musicians period, you know. I mean, Songwriter, guitarist, vocalist, producer. He’s just great all around.
JE: You collaborated with Gillian Welch here as well, correct?
CONOR: Yeah, on seven or eight songs. Only one of them ended up making the proper record, but we’re going to release the other ones at some point. And then David Rawlings, who’s kind of her songwriting partner and guitarist, I don’t know if you’ve ever seen them play live, but they’re like a duo. Songwriting partners, too. He played guitar on a lot of songs, and he’s unbelievable, just a crazy guitar player. It was exciting. Their record Time, the Revelator, it’s just a masterpiece. She has four records, but that’s my favorite one. They’re all incredible.
JE: Are you still not playing Clear Channel venues?
CONOR: Yep, still not doing it. It is additional work. Not so much for me, I just show up and play, but for the booking agent. Luckily he’s willing to do the extra work, and he’s really good about doing what the artist wants, and books Clear Channel venues for other acts. It’s not his thing, but he’s happy accommodate it, and if given the choice, he likes to go with the local independent promoter anyway. We had some chances to do some cool tours we would’ve wanted to do otherwise. We missed out on opening for The Cure, but that’s how it goes.
JE: You left Saddle Creek in Europe and signed with Universal. What prompted that?
CONOR: It’s a licensing deal with Polydor, which was a little bit of a step outside out of our normal world. The last two records were on Saddle-Creek’s European label. I don’t mind telling you because I’ve told them in detail, but they just don’t have their shit together at all. We tried to support them, but it was really kind of a disaster. I’ve been trying to tell Rob Nansel who runs the label that he should be content, he has a great US label. I appreciate his ambition, but he’s given it good shot. I’ve been encouraging him to just admit defeat, but he won’t, you know? But I can’t sacrifice my band. It’s not just me I have to look out for. It’s Nate (Walcott) and Mike and his family. We have to make decisions that are right for Bright Eyes as a band but not necessarily Saddle Creek as a cause. I think Rob understands. We’ll see how it works out.
JE: Were you surprised by the success of the last two records?
CONOR: Oh yeah. We were totally shocked by the sales and it’s not necessarily about that, but it certainly makes you feel good and it opens up a lot of opportunities when you are selling a lot of records to do more of what you want to do, whether it’s touring a certain way or having more money flowing through the label to do other bands, and we have Team Love, our other label, so we’re just trying to do some cool stuff with it.
JE: I saw you do a benefit show, Bring ‘Em Home Now, where you did an electrified reworking of “When The President Talks to God.” It reminded me of something Neil Young would’ve done. Is this something we can expect more of?
CONOR: That’s the only time we’ve done that, but we definitely always rearrange song,s because each band is a different setup. It’s one of the things I like most about having a rotating cast of musicians is that there’s always that opportunity to reinterpret songs and make it interesting for us, and hopefully, I hope that it’s cool as a fan when you buy a ticket for a show that you’re not sure exactly what you’re going to experience. I think that’s kind of exciting. Maybe people are disappointed sometimes, but I think it’s cool.
JE: You played that song live on the Tonight Show. Was that an issue for them, it being such a controversial song?
CONOR: I really respect them for letting me do it. They sort of encouraged us to pick a different song at first, but when they realized we weren’t going to, they said it was ok. Before the show the producers and everyone were kind of worried and they came in and talked to me a bunch. Jay Leno actually came in and told me these stories about how comedians were touring in Canada during Vietnam. He was actually really into it. I think that they really stuck their necks out, but I think it worked out for them. It made me respect them more.
JE: Were there any repercussions from it?
CONOR: On that tour we were playing that show in LA and we were making our way east, and we had both Conan and Letterman booked and coincidentally there were some mixups, and Conan was double booked, on accident (laughs) and Billy Idol played the night we were supposed to play. With Letterman, there was confusion with the calendar. It was actually a dark week where they weren’t taping shows. But I found it interesting that both of those were canceled coincidentally after Leno aired. It seems strange that they wouldn’t be ok with it, but maybe it was truly just a mistake or coincidence, I don’t know. I can’t be sure, but it was a little odd.
JE: I know the Desaparecidos record, which was overtly political, was largely written before 9/11. What was the original impetus for your foray into political writing?
CONOR: My awakening was probably the 2000 election. I was watching it somewhat interested, and I remember feeling immediately, feeling that there’s something wrong with this guy (George W Bush). Almost an instinctual reaction. Like this guy’s not intelligent at all, and really determined. he just seemed just frightening to me, even at that point. He was just off-putting, unsettling. And we were in Europe, and the whole thing with the results being disputed, and I was reading the paper over there and being like, “what’s going on? We still don’t have a president?” And with the Florida recount and all the creepiness surrounding that. That’s when I started to really pay attention, and 9/11 happened and it obviously accelerated everything.
JE: So that’s a continuing theme for you, even on this record.
CONOR: Yeah, I tend to write songs about whatever I’m thinking about, and there’s nothing as overt as “When the President Talks to God” on the record, but there’s an undercurrent on a lot of the songs that’s shaped by a lot of what’s going on. It certainly hasn’t gotten any less terrifying. It kind of just gets more frightening and more depressing all the time. I’ve learned to… I feel like I’ve become a bit desensitized to it… I mean, there’s only so long that they can keep you in a state of fear.
JE: The political climate’s changed so drastically, even since 2005
CONOR: Yeah, people are starting to connect the dots to what we’re doing right now. With the war on terror, the economy, I mean they’re all interconnected, big time. Corporations getting paid off, profiteering off the war, while poor people basically get poorer, the middle class disappears. They’re all completely tied together. You just need to wipe away the fog a little bit and look at it.
JE: When they talk about taxes and the billions of dollars being wasted, but corporations are getting rich off this. Cheney and Rumsfeld and Bush are all eventually going to profit from this. The money is going somewhere.
CONOR: Have you seen the Why We Fight documentary? It’s completely about that. People profiting off of war. Basically the thesis of it is that as a society we actually have to go to war a certain amount of times or when economic stars are aligned a certain way, that there’s no choice. It’s really interesting.
JE: So you were fairly burned out after the Wide Awake/Digital Ash cycle, correct?
CONOR: 2005 was sort of a barn burner of a year. We toured like ten months out of the year. It is what it is. We had a lot of fun, but when it came to at end in Thanksgiving of 2005, I was in desperate need of a break. 2006 was sort of a rebuilding sort of year. We recorded in a lot of comfort and took our time with everything. It’s hard to avoid deadlines, even if they’re self-imposed ones. For the most part it was a relaxing year. Now it seems like the right time to get back on the road and start performing again, getting back on the road, meeting people, shaking hands (laughs).
JE: Jack Nicholson once said that a celebrity meets more people in a month that the average person meets in his entire life.
CONOR: Yeah, I mean, it can be really interesting or exciting. Or it can be uncomfortable. But it’s more about being ready for it and in the right mental state to deal with everything. We’re trying to be a little wiser about how we’re planning our year, taking more breaks. We definitely have a long plan about touring and getting to all these different places, but we want to stay in good mental and physical health. Because if you don’t, it stops being fun, and the shows can suffer for it. You’re just not getting the most out of it if you run yourself into the ground.
JE: In taking a break you must have realized that you can do that if you want. You don’t have to get caught up in the cycle.
CONOR: Well, I like to stay busy, so I don’t mind working, but if you squeeze too hard you can lose your inspiration or lose perspective as to why you’re doing what you do, which is loving the material and wanting to present it in a good way. It takes a gentle hand to steer it right. Too much force can break things.
JE: You’ve always shared the spotlight with bands you wanted the public to be aware of. You’ve even had people playing in your band step forward and play a song during your set, like Craig Wedren or Ben Kweller or Joe Knapp from Son ,Ambulance, which is highly unusual.
CONOR: Yeah, well, I just love music and I’m fortunate to be exposed to such great music and have so many friends that are making such incredible songs. It’s so exciting. I don’t think there’s any better feeling than shedding a little light on someone who could use it or exposing a group of fans to something that I know they’re gonna love, but just haven’t heard it yet. That’s really cool. We’ve been lucky to be on tour with such amazing bands.
JE: I remember seeing you in 2005 with Tilly and the Wall, Feist, Coco Rosie, The Magic Numbers You sought out such eclectic acts that wouldn’t seem to work on paper, but come together really well somehow.
CONOR: I find that most of the kids that come to our shows, I hope it’s true, but it’s my perception that they seem pretty open to new things. We try to keep our interest in the bands we promote or tour with pretty eclectic so it’s not necessarily a genre thing. It’s far more interesting for me to hear or play with three totally different bands that excel at what they do than to see three bands that are all kind of trying to do the same thing, and one’s just better that it than the others.
JE: How were the shows opening for R.E.M.?
CONOR: Amazing. Those guys are so generous and thoughtful and encouraging. Really great people. All of them. Michael Stipe, especially, is just a great friend of mine and a really sweet person through and through, and very intelligent. I admire him a lot musically and for how he conducts his business, conducts himself with the causes he champions and the issues he chooses. He’s a good role model for people kind of in that middle age of a rock career. He’s not quite… he’s in a different place than a Bruce Springsteen or a Neil Young or something, you know? I feel like he’s still kind of creating his canon of music and his legacy as a musician is still being formed… whereas someone like Neil Young, what can you say, he’s kind of just done it all… just a living legend.
JE: Did you meet Neil on the Vote for Change tour?
CONOR: I met him there first, but we also played the Bridge School benefit in 2005. We got to go to his house and have dinner and spend time with him and it was unbelievable. It was the coolest, just so awesome! His songs are so great. He keeps making hits, man. I thought the Living with War thing was cool, and sonically it was really interesting as well, but I thought Prairie Wind was just a great record.
JE: Did you hear Greendale?
CONOR: That was cool too. It was pretty lo-fi to me actually, really dirty, but with some good songs, a little more conceptual. I didn’t get a chance to see the production of it with the stage and everything. Nate (Krenkel) saw it and said it was amazing. I think it would’ve been better to see the full production.
JE: I know you’ve talked about this a lot already, but can you talk about the Vote for Change tour you took part in back in 2004?
CONOR: It was amazing to be a part of something that transcended entertainment and had another purpose beyond just putting on a concert. That was really interesting and I’m really proud of what we did even though it maybe in some eyes wasn’t successful. In the end I think it will be successful, but it just brought awareness and hopefully changed some minds that are still happening to this day. I think it will be successful, but it’s taking longer than everyone wanted.
JE: How was it sharing a bill with Springsteen?
CONOR: As far as Springsteen goes, that’s another person that, I completely love his songs and admire him so much for how he does his business. He’s had the same road crew for thirty some years, which to me seems like such a statement about someone, that they would keep the same people around them for so long in all those years of traveling, taking care of them. I think it shows a lot of class, the fact that he’s not firing people left and right, and he’s really made a family of his crew and his band. I really respect that. He’s such a nice man and he made us feel totally welcome and comfortable when we were completely out of our element.
JE: Indie bands seem to be citing him more and more as an influence, especially The Hold Steady and Arcade Fire of late. I’ll admit that I’m not all that familiar with much of his work.
CONOR: Yeah, you should check it out. Greetings from Asbury Park is an amazing record. I think Nebraska is great. All of his records have two or three songs that are amazing, you know? Even straight into the eighties, stuff like Tunnel of Love.
JE: I was trying to watch his live DVD from Madison Square Garden. Have you seen that?
CONOR: I haven’t.
JE: I couldn’t get into it, all these insane solos and spotlights. It seemed way over the top.
CONOR: It makes a lot more sense when you’re there live. I mean wow, what a stage presence he has! To be able to make an arena feel exciting, that’s a true rare thing. I haven’t been to too many arena shows in my life, but the ones I have seen were pretty much a disappointment even when I loved the music. I remember seeing The Cure when I was ten or twelve in this big basketball stadium, and I was so far up and didn’t feel it. But for someone who can bring you in, and some might consider it cheesy or kind of over the top, but it’s a really hard thing to do. Springsteen does it really well. It’s kind of like being a stage actor, the way you have to make exaggerated gestures to get your point across.
JE: The title of the new record is Cassadaga. I understand it’s a town in Florida where there’s a large concentration of psychics. Was the sound collage opening the album recorded there?
CONOR: That’s a field recording, but not actually from there. It’s kind of a few different locations spliced together. Different psychics, you know. But the town itself is amazing. I’ve been there a couple of times and it’s a really peaceful place. The energy there just made me feel really calm and focused and I got a reading and kind of had this experience that I took with me, and even though at the time I didn’t know it, it ended up playing a part in some of the songs, and then one day it totally clicked. Like (snaps), obviously it was the title. I love those moments of clarity, you know? Whether it’s the music or writing the song or making the record and all of a sudden, it’s like “Exactly, how come I didn’t see it before!” So yeah, that’s kind of what that’s about.
JE: So you believe in the notion of psychic readings?
CONOR: I believe in a lot of things that they practice down there, not necessarily all of them. But the idea of spiritualism there is interesting to me. It started in the late 1800s there and they picked it geographically because there was some kind of energy they actually felt in that location, down in the swamp. I’m really into that notion of geographical centers of energy throughout the world, which sounds a little hippy I realize, but I think there’s a lot of truth to that.
JE: How do you feel about NY these days? Do you still live here?
CONOR: I do, and I like it. I’ve kind of realized a little bit over the past couple of years. I think that some people come to New York and it just gets inside of them and they just become a New Yorker and they’re never gonna leave. Like that guy for example (points towards Nate Krenkel), he came from Utah, lived here for fifteen years. He is a New Yorker. There’s nowhere he could go and feel the same or be as happy. I think I’m not really that person. I love the city and if I remain in a position financially where I could afford to always keep a place here, I probably would. I have so many friends here and it’s such an amazing place and there are a lot of reasons to be here. But that initial sort of love affair I had with the city when I first got here has subsided a little bit.
JE: Are you in Omaha much these days?
CONOR: I have a house there and Mike (Mogis) and I just built a studio there, which is amazing. We mixed the record there, but it wasn’t fully operational at that point. But I’m extremely excited to see what Mike does with that space. He’s obviously going to work with a lot of bands and I’m always in awe of how much he’s progressing as a producer and engineer. I’m just happy that I’m going to his partner in this studio, you know? I feel like I can probably retire and live off him making records for other people (laughs).
JE: He’s still touring with you, correct?
CONOR: Yeah, he is. He’s got a three year old daughter, and that’s going to be a little trickier. She used to go with us when she was younger, but once they start walking around and like grabbing things and hearing what everyone says all the time (laughs), it becomes a little more challenging. I’m sure she’ll come to some shows, but I’m personally nervous about her running around buses and back stages.
JE: What’s your next plan musically once the Cassadaga tour finishes?
CONOR: We’ve talked forever about doing a studio record with a little moonlighting band I have with Matt Ward and Jim James (My Morning Jacket) and Mike, and now that we have this new beautiful studio… I don’t want to jinx it, but I could see it happening, maybe in 2008. I might start a new band too. Who knows?
JE: What about Desaparecidos?
CONOR: It’s scattered. Denver (Dalley), our guitarist, moved to LA. And I’ve been busy obviously. I wouldn’t say it’s completely over, but its been difficult to make it work.
JE: I found it interesting that you made the electronic record under the Bright Eyes moniker (Digital Ash). Do you have any desire you go that route again?
CONOR: I’m always amazed that people refer to that as an electronic album. Obviously there’s some electronic elements, but to me it sounds like a rock album. Generally there’s not a lot of programming on it. Most of the drums are two drummers, but just with a lot of filters on the drums. I ran the drums through a lot of keyboards, filtering acoustics through the drums. I just consider it a very processed rock album. I guess it’s the word digital in the title makes people think that!
JE: Anything I missed that you want to talk about. I know you do a lot of interviews…
CONOR: Not really. I think you nailed it (laughs). I hear a lot of the same questions in interviews, so I like to throw in one lie every time just to make it interesting. You’ll have to figure that one out (laughs).