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I don't see any harm in letting whatever comes out come out of you, even if it's sort of weird, or dark, or painful, or too embarrassing, or whatever. I feel like you might as well get it down for yourself. It can't do anything but help you get to where you want to be by recognizing the thoughts that you're having.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
They say it's better to bury your sadness in a graveyard or garden that waits for the spring to wake from its sleep and burst into green.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes
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When I try to explain to people the big influences in my life, or at least when I first started, the most important ones were my friends who were also writing songs and were typically four or five years older than me.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
Desaparecidos try to be the opposite of apathetic. There are so many young people in America that are apathetic.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
When I was younger, I was somewhat of an idealist. I guess I'm a little bit more of a realist now. I think there's a lot that can be done to make the world a better place, but it's more about choosing your battles.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
I think that obviously the quest for purpose, or meaning, or understanding to existence is something that I always think about, always deal with. I guess everybody does - that existential crisis of human condition. It's nothing new. But I'd love to come across something that really made me believe in something.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
Once you realize that everyone is in the same boat, that everyone is just as insecure and childlike as everyone else, that all these jokers in D.C. ruining our world are just greedy kids grabbing for marbles - I think that realization means you're an adult.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
We, the Desaparecidos, are perfectly prepared for people to hate what we're saying or not like what we're saying.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes
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Love's an excuse to get hurt.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
The idea of forever is kind of ridiculous, which is unfortunate because its kind of a nice thing to say, you know. I think it softens the blow of mortality and having to say goodbye to everything you know and everyone you love and all that kind of thing.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
I find that moving keeps me optimistic, the idea of what's going to be down the road a bit or around the next bend.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
When you're 16 or 17, I think like most people that age, the first time you experience certain things in life, whether it's heartbreak or death or love, obviously it's going to seem like a much bigger deal.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
The first music I ever got into was the '80s alternative bands that my brother listened to, like The Cure and The Smiths and R.E.M. and Fugazi. I can remember specifically saying The Cure was my favorite band back in second grade.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
I do think that music has a special ability to get behind enemy lines and win hearts and minds.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes
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In a way, to have whatever people talk about as "crossover success," I think it means you start making bad music. I mean, when I'm flipping through the channels and see the VMAs or something, I don't really see any music there.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
Each Desaparecidos's song has a seed that it came from. We're trying to take that and broaden it out and make it resonate with people.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
I've never conceptualized much of what I write about. Maybe, once I'm onto something, I'll conceptualize a finished record. I want the songs to tie together and make sense together. I'm not like, "Oh, I want to explore this idea." That's just not how the creative process works for me. It's more like something strikes me, or finds me, and then I wrestle with it after that. I don't sit back in my armchair, like, "What kind of philosophy can I explore today?"
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
When you look at what people consider success in the music industry, it's just terrible music.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
I’m always fascinated when people really fervently believe, because I have such a hard time believing anything. When people have real faith in something, it’s fascinating to me. And the fact that so many people, in surveys, so many people say they do. It kind of blows my mind.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
Music becomes very personal. When you marry a message you want to send out into the world with good music, all of a sudden you have a very potent way of delivering your message.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes
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There's a very fine line between one person's reality and another person's fantasy.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
Let the poets cry themselves to sleep, and all their tearful words will turn back into steam.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
I have many friends who are both Mexican and Mexican-American and others who, I guess you would say, are somewhere in between. The ironic thing is that all three of those categories often exist inside of the same family.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
They say they don't know when but a day is gonna come. When there won't be a moon and there won't be a sun. It will just go black. It will just go back to the way it was before.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes