Category: Aside

From I’m Wide Awake It’s Morning (2005)

Notable lyric: I could have been a famous singer / if I had someone else’s voice / But failure’s always sounded better / Let’s f*** it up boys, make some noise!

There Is No Beginning to The Story (2002)

This song features one of the rare male voice duets in the Bright Eyes catalog. The two “free men” take turns doing a couple lines each, which builds with the repeated line of “now you’re body’s gone” and culminates in the explosive “angel, you will live!”. It’s an EP track that could have been on an album, and to get the visibility it deserves it should have been.

Notable lyric: we will be lifted / up from all of this, yeah, we will transcend / the insignificance of our existence / Yeah, your body’s gone, but, angel, you will live!

From Lifted Or the Story Is In the Soil, Keep Your Ear to The Ground

Notable lyric: He said, “I think I’m cured. / No, in fact, I’m sure of it. / Thank you Stranger, / for your therapeutic smile.”

From Fevers and Mirrors (2000)

What sets this song apart isn’t the song, necessarily, but what follows the song. The track is 8:29 long, but the music stops at 2:35. The rest of the track is an interview. Close scrutiny suggests that the track is, in fact, a satire or perhaps a parody. At the very least, it is staged. It takes place between a radio DJ and Conor Oberst. The DJ addresses many of Conors “quirks” in both appearance and music. It can make for a difficult listen if you take it at face value. However, when it comes to Bright Eyes, never take anything at face value.

Notable lyric: Well, winterÂ’s gonna end, / I’Â’m gonna clean these veins again. / So close to dying that I can finally / start living.

listen here

From Lifted Or the Story Is In the Soil, Keep Your Ear to The Ground (2002)

I’m not sure what I can say about this song that I haven’t said about others. It’s a pretty by-the-book Bright Eyes standard: lyrics riddled with self-doubt, emotional outburst at the end, and a solid musical arrangement. Yet, while some songs end in depression, and others in jubulation, this song just ends.

Notable lyric: Like when I fell under the weight of a schoolboy crush. / Started carrying her books and doing lots of drugs. / I almost forgot who I was, / but came to my senses.

From Cassadaga (2007)

Notable lyric: Out the window / as the car rolled / away / She just vanished / into a thick mist / of change

From Fevers and Mirrors (2000)

Bright Eyes enjoys, with gusto, adding in non-musical sound to their songs. Fevers and Lifted both began with long, long, long intros, seemingly of an unrelated nature. Both to have music fade in behind the sound, and finally the song takes place. While we don’t get a multi-minute children’s book narration, or a conversation between unknown individuals, we get tv sets, bangs, clanks, and pretty low quality music in general. Conor and a piano, and we wonder, is he in his house? Is he saying something about the state of music? Is this grand, or just lazy?

Notable lyric: But no matter what I would do in an attempt to replace / All these pills that I take, trying to balance my brain / See the curious girl with that look on her face / So surprised she stares out from her display case

listen here

From Noise Floor: Rarities 1998-2005 (2006)

I first heard this song on Letterman. There was a lot of buzz. Bright Eyes on Letterman! So we tuned in, and the band got up, and they played this song. And no one had ever heard it before. It was delightful, in many ways, to be party to that. It was a new song, and he was showcasing it live on national television. I went online and found a video of the performance, and then I found an mp3 of the audio from the performance. That was it, though. No one knew where the song came from, or where it would go. And all this begged the question: “When is he going to release it?” A Bright Eyes mystery, solved in 2005.

Notable lyric: so believe you’re who you are / and just stay in character / but at the end of the play the audience walks away / and you’ll be shivering cold on a well-lit stage.

listen here

From Lifted Or the Story Is In the Soil, Keep Your Ear to The Ground (2002)

Notable lyric: You write such pretty words / But life’s no storybook / Love’s an excuse to get hurt / And to hurt.