Conor Oberst

Conor Oberst (Merge)

By Erik Adams
Published: August 15th, 2008 | 9:00am

Strikingly direct and lasting barely over a minute, “NYC-Gone, Gone” is both the thesis statement and fictionalized press release for Conor Oberst’s eponymous Merge debut.

“Gone, gone from New York City / Where you gonna go with a head that empty? / Where you gonna with a heart that gone?” he sings over the stomping of the Mystic Valley Band, the group of friends and past collaborators enlisted by Oberst to flesh out his latest batch of songs. The answer to the songwriter’s rhetoricals was Mexico’s Valle Místico, which provided both a name for the backing band and an isolated environment for two months of recording.

The Bright Eyes frontman says he’s tired of writing about himself, but the characters of Conor Oberst display the kind of restlessness and desire to get away that leads to extended stays in desert locales. “There’s nothing that the road cannot heal” goes the refrain of “Moab,” and Oberst states it with the calmest conviction he’s ever mustered. He may disagree, but he’s putting a lot of himself into these songs.

There’s a couple standard-issue acoustic screeds on here, but Oberst and the Mystic Valley Band mostly match their wandering protagonists with rootsy folk rock. “I Don’t Want To Die (In The Hospital)” froths at the mouth with gleeful rockabilly desperation, and the swung downbeats of “Get-Well-Cards” cut a perfectly swerving path for the song’s drunken postman. Still, nothing really surprises on this solo debut — Oberst continues to craft good, occasionally great songs, but his folk-singer clothes are gaining a well-worn look. He’s still got a lot of road ahead of him, though, and there are a lot of sounds waiting for someone with an empty head and a gone heart.

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