Freddy Deknatel Assistant A&E Editor

After playing the song “Lua” during his Friday night show at Town Hall in New York City, Bright Eyes’s Conor Oberst may or may not have seen Lou Reed, the notorious and vastly influential former frontman of the Velvet Underground, seated in the fourth row, nodding his head approvingly. Either way, Oberst must have been aware of the evening’s hype and set-up. It was the closing night of his three-show run at Town Hall and the first leg of a tour to promote brand new album I’m Wide Awake, It’s Morning (released Jan. 25). Another album, Digital Ash in a Digital Urn, recorded with a darker, more technical-driven sound in mind, was simultaneously released that day. But these shows showcased the former album, a very folksy, at times jangly-Midwest-garage-rock record that tells the story of Oberst’s recent move to New York and is ready for popular take-off. I’m Wide Awake recalls the golden folk days of the early ’60s in New York, when Bob Dylan released his earliest records (The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan, Another Side of Bob Dylan) that were the first to feature a young, frenetic and hyper-talented Midwestern folkie moving to New York. Bright Eyes will tour later in 2005 with The Faint to play the synth-driven, more danceable songs of Digital Ash.

Taking I’m Wide Awake and its country, love-with-a-story songs to the stage, Oberst, now 24, satisfied the built-up promises that have been swirling since the double release was announced last fall. A more mature Oberst still spat angst indulgently, but not at the cost of delivering highly evocative, crafted songs that might propel him to the top stratum of modern songwriters. With songs at times even more successful than those on the 2002 album Lifted, or the Story Is in the Soil, Keep Your Ear to the Ground, 2005’s I’m Wide Awake will almost certainly take off. Its first single, “Lua,” plus “Take It Easy (Love Nothing),” the single from Digital Ash both remarkably reached spots one and two on the Billboard Hot 100 Singles Chart back in November, just after therekease of the two singles.

Some see the Oberst to Dylan comparison as a critic invention or just as sort of trite, and sometimes they are, but it’s hard to deny them when in one night Oberst can call back the giddy and political ’64 Dylan alongside the folk-rock raving circus leader Dylan was in 1975. Oberst plays with so many traces of those styles, but has his own with his angst, drive, and passion on stage. Yes, he is “emo,” but it’s not feigned. It’s just forcible playing over sharp, keen lyrics, and that shouldn’t place him in the broad, mostly boring emo pool. He’s out of the water, standing aside, ready to push, lead, and likely redefine the style, while shaping most of popular and indie music.

His pained, impassioned moodiness (like Morrissey some say) is still a spark on stage. Swigging bottles of Rolling Rock and talking low to bandmates between songs, Oberst led his rowdy,Nebraska band on the course he and his Saddle Creek label have set—lyrically-driven pop songs tinged with Midwestern folk/garage-rock-pedal steel, slide guitars, lots of keyboards, horns—that put Oberst, his croaking voice, and his words front and center.

His only speaking parts were reserved for his politics. “This is a song for our ignorant, arrogant, asshole of a President,” he slurred before the first encore, a song called “When the President talks to God.” Just after playing the opening chords, he paused to say “I forgot to say incompetent.” Cruder than Dylan and his “Masters of War,” but searing and political nonetheless.

Oberst echoed phrases through the set, like salvation, death, loneliess, and quite a few more prods at war and staunchly against the Bush Administration. However, he also recited more commonly emo lines about love, even some 20-year-old romantic metaphors erudite enough for an English class.

Anything but bland, his emotive side made the stage theatrical and electric, yet natural. Oberst is clearly comfortable in his rough skin. He can stand alone with a guitar and pine for love, or can perch over his drummer’s kit, his guitar neck pointed to the ceiling, and pound away before smashing the instrument into an amp and blowing the stage into a distorted mess.

The glut of magazine covers and feature stories on Oberst are annoying, and the popular side of the music scene is waiting with their arms open. But with the new records shedding the inflated hype and Bright Eyes playing on stage like they did last Friday, there’s reason to look past all the attention and see the real Oberst. He’s emo. He’s popular and sure to grow more so very soon. But he’s also vastly talented, and a model for reaching popular success without losing the independent side (the Saddle Creek label is one of the most influential in music today and still free of the major labels). It might not be so far off to draw a line from 2005 to 1965: Dylan’s first albums were easily praised, but reviewers couldn’t possibly have predicted his soaring arc. Maybe they’re trying to now with Conor Oberst.