Bright Eyes at the Opera House; Tuesday February 27, 2007

Bright Eyes at the Opera House; Tuesday February 27, 2007. 6.5/10

Conor Oberst is a late-twenty something year old indie vetran. Pumping out albums year after year with surprisingly new features--such as the instated violin parts and a more aggressive sound, like before accompanied by a horn secotion. This tour was entirely in support of his new album "Cassadaga", which is slated to be released on April 10, 2007 and more recently its EP titled "Four Winds" avaliable March 9, however was up for grabs at the show. From what i have heard this is a super worthy purchase!I really didn't liek the songs of his old material he chose to perform, however they maintained their expected amazing stage show, with his ever changing band-- apparently more recently including--Ben Kweller (!!JKLJDFS:F!), Janet Weiss (ex-Sleater Kinney on drums), Jason Boesel (Rilo Kiley!), M Ward and Rachel Yamagata just to name a few. I'm wondering if Ben Kweller was there because i didn't have a great view, but i'm absolutely certain that Janet Weiss was there on drums. Mike Mogis, the well respected producer (also produced: Johnathan Rice) played guitar for the entire set. Saddle Creek seems to have an pool of talented musicians to chose from, cheers to that.Janet Weiss especially helped out with vocal blends intially recorded by Emmy Lou Harris beautifully on the majority of his 2005 album--"I'm Wide Awake It's Morning". He featured a couple of tracks from this album in his set, none of which stuck out to me as songs that i would overly want to hear at his live show, playing "Old World Song (For the New World Order)" and "We Are Nowhere and It's Now" both songs heavily supported by Emmy Lou Harris' vocals, adequetly done by Weiss. I was super disappointed expecting to hear at least one of either--"Lua", "First Day of My Life" and most anticipated "Poison Oak" [WHICH IS ONE OF MY MOST PLAYED SONGS FOR THIS YEAR AND LAST SO GO DOWNLOAD IT NOWWWWWW!] I found "I'm Wide Awake It's Morning" to have a coming of age feel to it, which is why i think everyone should grab it, if it's something they can't presently relate to--at some time in the past they could or definately in the future, seriously buy it.I can always expect a brilliant sound when i see Bright Eyes--most of the time a full band, rich with instrumentation. I was super impressed with the togetherness of Obersts' band this time round. This shows the incredible musiciantship that the people on the Saddle Creek label. Conor's vocal sound sounded much more together than other videos and times i've seen him--apparently he often performs intoxicated or is "not all together"--it's the Rockstar way of handling things, oh so trendy...His appearance was drabby--he was greesy looking with his lengthy hair--as someone pointed out--very Jack White of the White Stripes and matched his Weiss, his female drummer's hair. I always find that he plays his image perfectly--the "Emo Kid" cliche (a very overused term to me). Although in actual fact he's not so much a kid anymore. Enough said.The new stuff has a great vibe--energetic and primarily with a band. This energetic sound parallels similarly to his work on his latter album--"I'm Wide Awake It's Morning". From what was played there was a drive, that was much more energetic and lively from what he initally started out from. To conclude--too much new stuff, not enough individual Conor and definately not enough old stuff.i bought a sweet shirt, it's a ouiji board creepy.

February 27, 2007