Conor Oberst of Bright Eyes Photo: Tony Bonacci

Touring behind 2024’s Five Dice, All Threes, Omaha natives Bright Eyes are coming to the Queen City. After lying low for a few years, lead singer and principal songwriter Conor Oberst has released a steady stream of new music, beginning with collaborative sessions alongside fellow songwriter Phoebe Bridgers that resulted in 2019’s self-titled Better Oblivion Community Center. That record was quickly followed by what became Bright Eyes’ tenth album, 2020’s Down in the Weeds, Where the World Once Was.

Bright Eyes’ music has since strayed from their earlier, folky beginnings. Those looking for the emotional bloodletting of classic songs like Fevers and Mirrors’ “Haligh, Haligh, a Lie, Haligh,” may be surprised to hear a song like “Bells and Whistles,” the opening track to Five Dice, All Threes. Major chords, whistling, jaunty glockenspiel and tambourine replace the lo-fi, hushed intimacy that those of us who grew up in the early 2000s, as Bright Eyes was gaining attention, have come to expect. Oberst said as much himself in an interview with NME for 2011’s The People’s Key, a notable departure from their previous aesthetic, stating that, for him, that particular sound had begun to “(wear) a little thin,” and that they instead decided to pursue one that aimed to be “rocking, and, for lack of a better term, contemporary, or modern.”

But while they have evolved sonically, what remains is Oberst’s lyrical gifts. It wouldn’t be a stretch to say that Oberst is one of a handful of our generation’s greatest lyricists. A standout track from Five Dice, All Threes is one simply titled “Hate.” Like John Lennon’s “God’ from John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band, Oberst sets out to kill sacred cows, from Jesus and Muhammad to an “LA shaman,” and the annoying necessity of small talk. It’s a powerful indictment of religious hypocrites and political figures while also an impassioned plea for something real, something more than the “artificial poets” that swarm the airwaves. After nearly 30 years of making music, Bright Eyes has proven time and again that there is nothing artificial about them; they’re the real thing.

Bright Eyes plays MegaCorp Pavilion on April 23 at 6 p.m. More info: promowestlive.com.

Related Stories

This article appears in Apr 16-29, 2025.