Bright Eyes is one of many projects instigated by indie singer-songwriter and guitarist Conor Oberst (b. Conor Mullen Oberst, 15 February 1980, Omaha, Nebraska, USA). His recordings explore a similar lo-fi territory to the work of Will Oldham and Bill Callahan's Smog, although Oberst's tremulous vocals and almost adolescent verbosity sometimes betray his relative youth.
Oberst began his recording career at the age of 13, issuing an acoustic-based, home-made solo cassette. Over the next seven years, he reportedly penned hundreds of songs and appeared on albums by outfits such as Commander Venus, among others. Obviously, many of Oberst's originals went unused, especially ones penned between 1995 and 1997. The indie label Saddle Creek listened to the demos recorded during this time, and offered to issue a compilation, eventually released in 2000 as A Collection Of Songs: 1995-1997 and credited to Bright Eyes. Oberst decided to continue to go by the Bright Eyes name, even though he was joined by other musicians on subsequent recordings. Further releases soon followed at a breakneck pace, including several EPs and split singles. The superlative 2002 release Lifted Or The Story Is In The Soil, Keep Your Ear To The Ground helped introduce Bright Eyes' music to a wider audience, with the US rock press championing Oberst as one of the brightest songwriting talents to emerge from the alternative scene.
In October 2004 Oberst joined the Vote For Change Tour, joining acts such as Bruce Springsteen, Pearl Jam and the Dixie Chicks in a series of shows touring swing states prior to the US presidential election. His prolific songwriting bore fruit the following January with the simultaneous release of two separate but stylistically different Bright Eyes albums, the acoustic I'm Wide Awake, It's Morning and the harder-edged Digital Ash In A Digital Urn. Oberst also enjoyed notable success on the US singles charts with the tracks "Lua" and "Take It Easy (Love Nothing)". In the UK his career has stalled somewhat after his clumsy comments from the John Peel Stage at the Glastonbury Festival in 2005. The remarks were about the much-loved disc jockey and Oberst was clearly unaware of how important Peel remains in the hearts of the British public.
