[rating=6.00]
It’s been nearly a decade since Conor Oberst followed up a few preceding years of solid work with his masterpiece, I’m Wide Awake, It’s Morning. That album, released under his Bright Eyes moniker, has stood up nicely over the ensuing years, and continues to be cited time and again by critics and fans alike, as a measuring stick for all of Oberst’s subsequent work. Fair or not (probably not), I’m Wide Awake was such a top to bottom solid set of songs that anything that follows was bound to be a bit of a letdown. As most fans know, Digital Ash in a Digital Urn, Oberst’s frequently thrilling electronic tinged album was released simultaneously and failed to attract as much praise or widespread acclaim, so it makes sense that his work in the years since have flown a bit under the radar.
Give Conor credit, though. While not shying away from his earlier success, he also hasn’t rested on his laurels, as he’s kept the releases coming, with further material emanating from Bright Eyes, his own given name, and collaborations with like-minded artists in Monsters of Folk and Desaparecidos. He’s also been linking lately with Swedish sibling folk-rockers First Aid Kit, California country-rockers Dawes, and singer-songwriter/producer Jonathan Wilson, all of whom have imprints on Oberst’s new release, Upside Down Mountain, out this month on Nonesuch Records.
Mr. Wilson brings a heavy Laurel Canyon ‘70s vibe to his projects, and frequently adds on backing singers, horns, glockenspiel, and various other layering effects to help adorn acoustic ditties. All of that is present here over the course of the 13-track album, sometimes to positive effect and sometimes to detriment. Oberst is a pensive and insightful lyricist, prone to self-reflection and often honest critiques of his own misgivings and regrets. This works well in a stripped down setting where his quavering voice can have the space necessary to render the words their proper space.
Songs like the softly shuffled “Artifact #1”, the pedal steel-tinged “Lonely At The Top”, and the sweetly affectionate, Paul Simon-esque “You Are Your Mother’s Child” work well in terms of blending the words and sound. Oberst’s lyrics here: “Standing on the edge/Of a million landscapes emptying/The water from the glacier fills my shoes”, have a preoccupation with time and space and center around the metaphorical “big-picture” issues of death and our place in the world.
Rather than the raging protesting persona Oberst has embodied in some past releases, listeners get the introspective Oberst, the one capable of crafting a few simply phrased lines that say so much more below the surface. These songs demand a more scaled back approach and work well with minimal fuss and infusion. When the songs’ tempos rise a notch, the arrangements suffer a bit and tend to overshadow a good lyric or phrase. This is particularly evident on songs like album-opener “Time Forgot” “Kick”, and “Desert Island Questionnaire”. There’s just too much going on here: fussy horns, chirpy keyboard quirks, and overwrought backing vocals that detract from the wordy stories Oberst attempts to tell. There’s proof in Oberst’s oeuvre that he can rock out in a straightforward manner. Here’s wishing he had chosen to do so more often when the songs called for it.
Oberst’s career is an interesting one. Undoubtedly one of the best songwriters of the 2000’s, he staked his territory early and fast and has followed a bit of a meandering road over the course of his past few releases. While he’ll probably always unfortunately be judged by his earlier triumphs, it’s good that he continues to follow his muse around each corner it leads him. “When I can’t sleep my mind is a circle/I watch the ceiling fan/I close my eyes and I feel the wind blow/My bed it turns into a raft”, he says on “Night At Lake Unknown” as almost evidence of his dedication to the craft. There may not ever be a document that serves as a perfect encapsulation of his ideas and vision, but hopefully the hits continue to outweigh the misses and the songs keep coming for us to parse through and examine.
