Bright Eyes, Big City Interview -by Alyson Camus

But here are a few interesting things:

The People’s Key may well be Bright Eyes final album.

The album was inspired by science fiction, faith and politics with references to the Holy Trinity, Haile Selassie and Rastafaris, Sisyphus, Caesar, the second coming, enlightenment and non-violence.

This seems really ambitious and interesting, but science fiction? Yes, Conor Oberst says he likes the genre, citing Arthur C. Clarke, Philip K. Dick, Vonnegut, and Margaret Atwood as his favorites.

A friend of his, Denny Brewer, who has a band called ‘Refried Ice Cream’, had a big influence on the album. He is the spoken-word narrative voice running through the record, telling stories about ‘crazy-sounding prophecies, space, tyrants, enlightenment’.

The record is ‘reggae-influenced but not musically, just lyrically’, as Rasta culture also seems to be one of Conor’s many interests:
’Just the idea of preaching one-ness, that we’re all in this together. Which I suppose is at the root of most any religion’
In fact, one of the song is entitled ‘Haile Selassie’, who is revered as the returned Messiah of the Bible, God incarnate, among the Rastafari movement.

In the interview, Conor appears quite humble, saying that the experiences he had doing the Mystic Valley Band and the Monsters of Folk albums were a chance to learn more about music, and to learn from Jim James from My Morning Jacket, and M. Ward, two songwriters he admires, but he also sounds quite sage, avoiding the trap when asked a political question: ‘I’m not an economist’.

He also gives his opinion about religions, admitting his lack of belief but confessing being fascinated by others’ faith:

‘ Yeah I would say I’m a humanist. I like that. I mean, I don’t claim to know anything, but I’m curious about it all. I’m always fascinated when people really fervently believe, because I have such a hard time believing anything. When people have real faith in something, it’s fascinating to me. And the fact that so many people, in surveys, so many people say they do. It kind of blows my mind.’
[…]
‘Well I definitely think it’s [religion] responsible for a lot of the evils of the world. I mean that’s not really in debate, you know? But at the same time, I think whatever gets you through the day, whatever helps you make sense of life you know? I’m not gonna begrudge my grandmother with her rosary beads. It works for them. And at the end of the day, I don’t claim to know the answer to anything.’