Bright Eyes frontman taking care of business

By Bill Werde

OMAHA, Nebraska (Billboard) - Conor Oberst sits in a dive bar, pulling on Winston Lights and throwing back intermittent gulps from a beer bottle.

This isn't the downtown New York- or Los Angeles-variety "dive" with the beautiful people and the perfectly curated juke box. This is the suburban Omaha sort, where a handful of pear-shaped, geriatric regulars sit drinking, solo, at two in the afternoon, mumbling conversations to themselves. The juke box plays only AC/DC.

Oberst, better-known as Bright Eyes, is here -- away from his handlers, bandmates and friends that dot the frigid Omaha landscape -- to confront the perception, more or less, that he is selling out.

It's a sensitive issue for an artist like Oberst. This is the guy who swore off playing Clear Channel venues, before the touring division of that corporation spun off to become Live Nation. Oberst is so identified with the Omaha-based independent Saddle Creek label that has released all of his albums stateside, that many mistakenly believe he has an ownership stake in the label. In short, Oberst's career, from his first four-track recordings as a young teenager in the early-to-mid '90s, to his last breakout pair of albums -- the acoustic "I'm Wide Awake It's Morning" and the electronic-y "Digital Ash in a Digital Urn" -- have embodied the DIY indie ethic.

But as he prepares to release his sixth proper album, "Cassadaga," changes in Oberst's career approach are coming fast and furious. In January, fans and blogs caught on that the official thisisbrighteyes.com site was run by Universal Music Group, and it soon came out that Oberst had signed Bright Eyes to a deal with the music giant's Polydor arm for overseas distribution. In February, he shot the first music video of his career that would actually feature him performing. He'll stop by AOL -- a first -- to record a "Sessions" performance and also play a couple radio promo shows. Notably, early last year, once the touring and media attention paid to "Wide Awake" died down, he signed on to the Ravenhouse Ltd. management company. His new manager, Juan Carrera, oversaw Modest Mouse's transition from indie darling to selling more than 1 million copies of its last release.

Oberst doesn't blink when confronted with these developments, doesn't fidget. There's no dramatic pull from a Winston Light.

"Why don't we take them one at a time," he says. "Then you can draw whatever conclusions you will."

First things first. Whether you think Conor Oberst now shills tunes for The Man or not, you have to hand him this: He's doing a hell of a job at it. "Cassadaga," to be released April 10, represents a sensible evolution for those who have been on the Oberst train from its early days.

Earlier in the day over lunch, Oberst and new bandmates Mike Mogis and Nate Walcott discuss the making of the new album.

"In the past, I've gone in with a real set idea for what I wanted it to sound like," Oberst says. "This one was much more, 'Let's just record as many songs as we have, whatever style, and then kind of pick.'"

It's odd to call Mogis and Walcott "new," as producer and multi-instrumentalist Mogis has worked with Bright Eyes for more than 10 years and Walcott, master of strings, for much of this decade. But Oberst says he wanted to take the focus off of himself and felt that making the pair "official" would help. On "Cassadaga," Mogis says, the lack of a preconceived, consistent concept meant he had the opportunity to take inspiration from his favorite recordings -- everything from "Animal Collective" to "Pet Sounds," T Rex to the Mamas & the Papas -- to create new cuts. "Sometimes we would just stop working and listen to records," Mogis says. "Not in their entirety, but just little pieces."

"Make a Plan" clearly channels Phil Spector, for example. "Make a plan to love me," Oberst sings quietly, before the song swells to grandiose moments of strings and horns. The band even created a girl group to sing backup on the track and elsewhere on the album.

At varying moments, "Cassadaga" veers from rockier segments like the guitar-driven, honky-tonk stomper, and first single, "Four Winds," to quieter, contemplative songs laden with strings, piano and Oberst's trademark, wavering voice. And of course, the tunes are scattered with metaphor-riddled, self-referential lyrics.

One of the album's prettiest tracks, "Cleanse Song," invokes the sunshine-y '60s California rock of the Mamas & the Papas, and seems to speak to Oberst's own experiences. "If life seems absurd, what you need is some laughter," he sings above what sounds like quiet bongos and those sweetly cooing backup girls. "And a season to sleep and a place to get clean."

It's a new tune for old-school Bright Eyes fans, who may be most accustomed to the singer's seemingly endless cycles of substance abuse and self-loathing. There are no shortage of stories -- some in Oberst's own songs -- of the singer getting out-of-his-mind drunk. "You never knew which Conor was going to show up in the old days," Saddle Creek label manager Jason Kulbel says.