Son of JayJamJah

Album #2: Fevers and Mirrors (2000)
Bright Eyes
Genre: Indie Folk
Dedicated to MB Member: Crowquill\Sleepy Jack

1. "A Spindle, a Darkness, a Fever, and a Necklace"
2. "A Scale, a Mirror, and Those Indifferent Clocks"
3. "The Calendar Hung Itself..."
4. "Something Vague"
5. "The Movement of a Hand"
6. "Arienette”
7. "When the Curious Girl Realizes She Is Under Glass"
8. "Haligh, Haligh, a Lie, Haligh"
9. "The Center of the World"
10. "Sunrise, Sunset"
11. "An Attempt to Tip the Scales"
12. "A Song to Pass the Time"

Quite simply some of the most emotionally consuming music I’ve ever come across. Connor Oberst can seem as naïve and innocent as a child as a ferocious and ominous as any audible evil. Each song is in some way an expulsion of emotion personified best by the painstaking vocal patterns that catapult the listener through chaos within each narrative, each melody, each measure. The first third of the album is a wonderfully orchestrated progression culminating with the absolutely flawless “Something Vague” A song so moving in its simple familiarity and conviction driven delivery as to bring one to tears. It’s not that the lyrics are great, it’s just a wonderful way of arranging words to tell a story that takes so much longer then 3 and a half minutes,
That is one of the inherent qualities of the album that has always intrigued me. Each song is so effective at reaching you and forcing you tolerate or tune out. Very powerful but easy music. The middle third of the album opens with “The Movement of a Hand” which has a precious and proverbial chorus that finds its way into your subconscious and digs in. The album has hit its stride at this point, it’s impossible to tell if this is done with intent, but it’s a common theme within good albums; the momentum intensifies and resides with the ebb and flow of the music at just the right times. The peak of the album is probably tracks seven and eight as Oberests’ most personally cathartic performance "When the Curious Girl Realizes She Is Under Glass” a two verse explosion of a song gives way to “Haligh, Haligh, a lie, Haligh” maybe the most mass-appeal number on the album and a very easy song to enjoy. It has elements of the emotional first half plus of the album and still a hint of a bit more polish and attention to detail without sacrificing honesty or conviction.
It didn’t take many listens for me to develop an interest in this album. I’ve pretty much enjoyed it from the start; still I’ve can’t say I’ve ever really understood the final third of this album. There is a sort of distant ballad of a song within foreshadowing elements of the bands future direction, a gentle but eerie almost sinister number in “Sunrise Sunset”, a sweet little song with a mock interview that I can’t even begin to understand and a distorted closing number that seems to have little or nothing to do with anything. Still I enjoy it externally as the music is irresistible to people like me who have always been drawn to simple raw acoustic guitar driven music. I like this album a lot more then most of you’d probably expect.

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