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My favorite rhymes are sort of half-rhymes where you might just get the vowel sound the same, but it's not really a true rhyme. That gives you far more flexibility to capture the feeling you're trying to express. But sometimes it's best not to have any rhyme.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
You can only really understand good if you have bad, so the idea of heaven or anything that happens for eternity, even if it's nice, I can't imagine it being nice forever. Even the idea of forever is kind of ridiculous, which is unfortunate because it's kind of a nice thing to say, you know.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes
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The sound of loneliness makes me happier.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
Rastafarianism and reggae music have always kind of resonated with me. Those ideas of redemption, liberation and overcoming oppression through music, weed and community. Fighting evil through love and music, I think it's just a really powerful idea.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
I mean, you just go down the line, and with any of these issues, it's about rich people staying rich. And using poverty as a weapon against people. That's what we see every day. And I'm not an economist, so I can't speak to the nuances of it, but just common sense tells me the whole thing is corrupt.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
Since the songs were written over a five-year period, I think these are little snapshots. Some people call it political or topical, but I think each song is self-contained. I think it fits together as a picture of the last half-decade of time.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
The way my life's structured, I don't stay in a place for more than a couple months.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
We must memorize nine numbers and deny we have a soul.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes
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On good days, I can see the inherent goodness in people, and that human beings have a high capacity to learn and adapt. But things like the environment, nuclear weapons and ideas like peak oil - if you think about them too much, they can really freak you out.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
I'm kind of like, "never say never."
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
To outsiders it probably seems like splitting hairs, but to me, Bright Eyes is a simply the collaboration between myself and Mike Mogis and Nate Walcott. What you hear is definitely the sum of all our ideas and represents all three of us. But I still write the songs myself.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
Rock and roll seems to have had a mellowing in the business where it got harder to sell individual records and make money doing that.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
I'm a real music fan, so I listen to all kinds of music all the time. I listen to a lot of what my friends or people I know are listening to. I'm always checking out new bands.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
The worst thing you can do as an artist is to repeat yourself.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes
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And your eyes must do some raining if you're ever gonna grow / When crying don't help, you can't compose yourself / It's best to compose a poem, an honest verse of longing / Or a simple song of hope.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
When everything is lonely I can be my best friend.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
Every time I finish a song... most of the time it's in my own head, like this sounds too much like a Townes Van Zandt song, or whoever. I realize there are so many melodies and chord progressions in pop and rock music that are so similar that you can kind of trace it back to other things. Most of the time it's just in your head.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
I want to be the surgeon who cuts you open Who fixes all of life's mistakes I want to be the house that you were raised in The only place where you feel safe. I wanna be a shower in the morning That wakes you up and makes you clean I know I'm just the weather against your window As you sleep through a winter's dream
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
I went right from wunderkind to washed up. Old. Been around too long. That's just the way I feel. That's my internal dialogue.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
I think our music is more about seeing ourselves in each other and trying to find a more humanistic viewpoint for the world.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes
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If you love something, give it away...
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
On every Bright Eyes record, there's some kind of sound collage that begins it. Some of them have dialogue, some don't. I like it because it can kind of slow down the attention span a bit. It's a way to draw you in to the rest of the record.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
If the world could remain within a frame like a painting on the wall, I think we'd see the beauty then and stand staring in awe.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes -
Screaming is bad for the voice, but it's good for the heart.
Conor Oberst Bright Eyes