Sure the warbling voice is frustrating, but are Bright Eyes and Conor Oberst irredeemable beyond the bleating vocals? Frankly, I couldn’t get past Oberst’s contrived sincerity in time to listen closely to the music or the words he was yodeling as Bright Eyes, so Conor Oberst’s solo album was my first real study of his work. I was ready for some hating, but then…

The first track played through and it’s really good. ‘Cape Canaveral’ wouldn’t stand up under academic poetic analysis for hanging on the same rhyme scheme for four stanzas, but it’s a mature and evocative love letter to thinkers that Oberst admires for being out of reach and also deep in the psyche. I’m absolutely hooked on this number. Bastard.

And just like the better moments of Bright Eyes cause me to say, “Maybe I’m missing something because [this one track] is kinda sweet,” the opening solo number suggested that the worst is over. But there is an entire album that follows…

In this era there is a different criteria by which we judge rock, and tracks 2-12 remind me what a bunch of pussies are the curs who have claimed the throne of rock ‘n roll. Conor Oberst, unlike the oft-compared Bob Dylan, is not of a lineage of men who fought with their battle axes the way to the top; who snarled their way to glory; who fucked to immortality. The new crew, of whom Oberst is a ringleader, can’t be bothered to put up their dukes, lest they spill some wine on their pants while posing as rockers. And unlike our forefathers and foremothers of Rock who demanded (and got) sex and drugs, these insouciants are begging to get laid. In that way, I guess rock ‘n roll is still about getting chicks, at least…

Back to Conor’s music…

Oberst hints at but fails to land the bulls-eye of Bon Iver’s facile moments of quiet underscore. So he takes a rocker’s stance, right? He doesn’t exactly do that either. Some advice to disregard: If you’re going to rock then rock, or just relax and quit the half-assery! He even sings it straight until track 6 ‘I Don’t Want to Die (In the Hospital)’ when someone handed him a working jackhammer during the vocal takes. Vibratory urgency aside, it all feels stiff where ‘Canaveral’ is slick. From loud to soft to adult contemporary, the album (sans excellent track 1) goes from track to track w/o a single emotional groundswell or a ballzy moment that doesn’t fall as flat a that one racist joke you once told when the black guy from accounting came up silently behind you during the punch line.

Forget relaxing to Conor Oberst, but I’m more ready for bed than ready to rock. The fans will love this shit because most are men who also beg for sex, or women that fall for it. Despite (or because of) my bandmates’ attempts to get me to dig this guy, I fail to see the imperfections as the sycophants do, that is, as genius. To my credit, I might add.

Merge Records
August 5, 2008

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