Bright Eyes

Concert Reviews • Sunday September 16th, 2007 • 10:10 pm

Bright Eyes filled up both floors of the Capitol Theater with a welcoming audience of Olympians, ranging from teenage girls to punks to a few middle-aged couples who perhaps are drawn by his latest, more traditional folk rock album, Cassadaga. What unites them all are Conor Oberst’s poetic expose of heartbroken, drug ridden nights sang with his wavering, emotionally engaging appeal that makes it seem like the words of lost loves still haunt him. The Capitol Theater was built in 1924, and it retains the modernist, grandiose architecture of the era, with ceilings as high as cathedrals that shape a dramatic, yet intimate atmosphere, making it an ideal spot for Bright Eyes, who love to exploit the delicate balance between dramaticism and intimacy. When he’s not exploding into booming melodious tantrums that demand attention, he’s recouping into a self-conscious introvert belting confessions. Oberst is all about dynamics, often transitioning from his delicate acoustic strumming with a cymbal crash leading into a heavier, country rock chorus. The crescendos and whispers functioned beautifully in the large space, the sounds echoing up the crimson drapes and then retracting back to Oberst’s melancholic center like ocean tides rising and falling.

Kimya Dawson (whom I unfortunately arrived too late to see) and Nik Freitas opened. Freitas is a Visalia, CA native, and former Thrasher skate photographer, whose bluesy guitar playing set an adequate tone for the night, singing catchy pop-rock recounts of women and the subsequent pathetic loneliness they create, which has Nik writing cute lines pitched in a nasally tone you can thank Bob Dylan for. He is a talented, shy musician who seemed much more confident performing than he did talking between songs, though his nervous demeanor made him approachable and opened a casual dialogue with the audience. I always like the intimacy of this venue, where I feel no separation between the audience and the artist, when the performer is not on some god-like pedestal, but is in fact within arms reach. It was a treat to see Freitas’ classic songwriting capabilities that I’m sure will really take off in the near future. For his final number, Freitas had some surprise instrumental backup from Bright Eyes members (Oberst included) that added layers of depth to his sound and made me wish they collaborated for every song he did.

One downside to seeing Bright Eyes live is waiting a good half hour while the roadie tunes the myriad of orchestral instruments strewn about the stage. Once the sound checks are up to par, Oberst and his fluctuating posse graced the stage to amorous applause. Besides Oberst, Mike Mogis and Nate Walcott are the only official members of the Omaha based group. Mogis looks like an indie-computer-programmer who could just as easily be working for NASA, with a striped sweater clinging to his scrawny body, occasionally casting a smirk towards Oberst that reveals a lifelong friendship dating back to boyhood recordings in their parents’ basements. He operates the pedal steel guitar with an articulate demeanor, sliding up and down the frets to produce that characteristic chord bending sound essential for any romantic.

Taking their places without introduction, Bright Eyes started off with “An Attempt to Tip the Scales,” a tribute to Oberst’s more vulnerable Fevers And Mirrors era. Oberst has grown up with a four track attached to his hip, allowing us to chronicle his development and watch him come from a lo-fi, whiny adolescent to a socially conscious story-teller, who is still sometimes whiny. They quickly jumped to a later date in their discography and led into “I’m Wide Awake, It’s Morning,” a angst full track made with the solid arrangement and traveling style that we can thank Bob Dylan for again. This song displays his growth as a songwriter, now able to root himself in safe, cleanly developed melodies as opposed to spewing furtive lines from an unstable harmony.

Cassadega stands as a greater evolution in the direction paved by I’m Wide Awake, It’s Morning. It’s a classically composed album that manages to stand out due to Oberst’s Americana interpretations of contemporary issues, launching him as a voice of our generation. His recent abandonment of self-absorbed topics is an inevitable result of his growing up and becoming worldlier (touring will do that to you), but I do miss the depressing, obsessed thoughts of his narcissistic youth. Attempting to politicize oneself after gaining a following through more personal songs can be a difficult transition to make, and can be the artist’s siren song, but Conor hasn’t lost his ability to keep audiences hooked just yet. You could hear a pin drop in the crowd as he played “Poison Oak,” the emotive, regretful tale of boyhood love with nostalgic, hesitant guitar strums that paint the same picture. The song ended dramatically, with Conor crying out; “When I hit the keys/ It all gets reversed/ The sound of loneliness/ Makes me happier.”

“Four Winds” is a great song because of the beautiful, daunting violin strokes that start it out. I was bummed when I didn’t see a violin on stage, but leave it to Mogis to step up to the plate and offer an electric guitar adaptation of the violin part, still not up to par with the real deal but satisfyingly close. Staying in country chic, the band romped through “If The Brakeman Turns My Way” and “Another Traveling Song,” with a rolling drumbeat that could be a soundtrack to train hoppers nationwide.

Bright Eyes then played some hits off their electronic Digital Ash In A Digital Urn, performing quality instrumental adaptations of the digitized sounds that gave it a theatrical life not achieved on the CD. “Arc of Time” began with its tropical tom-drum beat, backed by a swarm of happy guitar pluckings and tambourine shakes that climaxes on three synchronized notes where Oberst screams “[You will] Die! Die! Die!” Only in this instance he manages to make death sound more upbeat than frightening.

Throughout the show Conor is spewing spit into the front row; the spray of saliva can be clearly seen flying past the microphone as he yells, which he later jokingly attributed to his “overactive saliva gland.” He took moments between songs to exchange greetings and laughs with the audience, at one point getting asked “How do you like Olympia?” To which he responded, “I think it’s cool, man,” right before heading into his next song.

I’m usually at shows I can mosh or dance to, so whenever I see acousticly toned acts such as Bright Eyes, I get sick of standing real fast. While he played lots of great songs, oldies and new, there were still a few songs in the set that had me yawning. Also, I get pissed at Conor sometimes. He stands there in his pointy, leather shoes with shoulder length hair parted down the middle, traversing the stage in his tight straight leg denims and that whole “jacket with a hoodie underneath” look, making him the ultimate hipster of all hipsters, able to constantly sing about how sad he is and how he has to cope with his hard troubles of living or losing his girlfriend by blowing cocaine. If he didn’t somehow imbue this act with talent, I’d say he sounds like a fashionable, privileged, whiny, co-dependent, liberal bitch.

Maybe my inner whiny, co-dependent cokehead side attaches to him, because I find Bright Eyes to now be one of those guilty pleasures that I only still listen to from time to time because I grew up loving it. But now all my friends listen to punk or hip hop, and while I still suffer from depression, I no longer find the cure in listening to mopey tunes that only bring me down further. Sure, there’s “Bowl of Oranges,” but that’s like one happy song for how many sad ones? Point being, I’ve grown past relating to Bright Eyes since it became a given there will be giggly, indie rock girls at every show who listen to Coheed And Cambria and scream “I love you Conor!” like he was Nick Carter back in ‘99.