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Bright Eyes
is as pure a love-it-or-hate-it proposition as you'll
find in the music world. Some see Conor Oberst, the
Midwestern prodigy who's been releasing music since
his adolescence, as the full fruition of the home-recording
revolution, a raw-throated, unique vocalist and ambitious
lyricist with the potential to redefine the singer-songwriter
field. For others, his wavering voice and self-conscious
boy-genius profile stick in the craw, and his occasional
lyrical missteps or indulgences are beyond forgiveness
on the grounds of youth.
Just by giving his new record the exhaustive title
of Lifted or The Story is in the Soil, Keep
Your Ear to the Ground, the waifish wunderkind
paints a big fat target on his chest for the haters.
Despite cursory nods toward concepthood, this disc
is just a big old swim inside the ocean of Oberst,
a kid who thinks too much and obsesses over the problems
and complications he has created, looking for relief
in the bottle, music and his friends. To be fair,
the lyrics indicate that even he has grown wary of
the trap of his own persona. "Onto a stage I was pushed/
With my sorrow well rehearsed/ So give me all your
pity and your money now," he spits on "False Advertising."
Not that excoriating himself and his music will get
Bright Eyes off the hook with detractors.
Which is a shame, because the best moments on Lifted
give off the loose vibe of a warped folkie backed
by a corps of his drunken friends on kitchen-sink
instrumentation, like a countrified cousin to Neutral
Milk Hotel's modern-day psych-pop classic In the
Aeroplane Over the Sea. It sounds like catharsis,
and it sounds like a party. While Oberst deploys his
vocal tics more sparingly and to greater effect than
before, self-indulgence still haunts this album. At
70-plus minutes, it's as sprawling as its title and
comprised largely of rambles, only a couple of which
yield up as much as a repeated refrain. The results
differ from song to song. On opener "The Big Picture,"
it sounds like the kid has learned all the right lessons
from Dylan; on closer "Let's Not Shit Ourselves" he
goes on more than a few verses too long.
But
that's the deal with Oberst -- there's no editing
him, and the wonderful little revelations come along
with the awkward teen poetry. Thankfully, to break
up what might otherwise be tough going, there are
pockets of welcome variation like the Ryan Adams-style
hootenanny that closes "You Will," the easygoing piano-ornamented
pop of "Bowl of Oranges" and the gossamer beauty of
"Nothing Gets Crossed Out." Nonetheless, the haters
will hate and the lovers will love, with the uninitiated
left to pick sides. And for those of us with glazed
eyes and ink stains on our hands, Oberst offers, "I
do not read the reviews/ No, I am not singing for
you."
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