Sit at the Kids Table. Go to prom. Try a new SSRI. Deface a mural. Flip the mattress. Help a bird. Dissociate. Last vacation. These landmark occasions are inscribed on the board-game-inspired cover of the new Bright Eyes EP, Kids Table. And therein lies the chiaroscuro of Bright Eyes’ music, perpetually teetering between rogue optimism and pragmatic despair. Following the band’s 2024 visceral and hook-filled Five Dice, All Threes, the new EP exists as both a partner-in-crime to that album, and a self-contained world all of its own. While many of these new songs emerged from the same recording sessions at Omaha’s ARC Studios as Five Dice, they didn’t all quite fit the concise cohesion of that album. So it was always the plan of Conor Oberst, Mike Mogis, and Nate Walcott to find another seat for these outliers at the proverbial kids table, “eaten off the ironing board like we did at our big family holidays,” jokes Oberst, in a nod to the EP’s cover art. “Kids Table” and “Dyslexic Palindrome” both feature Hurray For The Riff Raff’s Alynda Segarra, a continued creative partnership following the two bands’ recent tours together and viral live version of Bright Eyes fan-favorite, “Lua.” And while a Bright Eyes ska song was likely not on this year’s bingo card (or game board), “1st World Blues,” cowritten with Alex Orange Drink (So So Glos), makes a case for a fourth wave of the genre, with its biting takedown of contemporary American civilization decline, propelled by gang vocals and an infectious off-beat rhythm. Cultural references both high and lowbrow pepper the EP - namechecking everyone from Salman Rushdie, Joe Strummer, and Candace Bergen in “Victory City” and Shakespeare, Guy Fawkes, and Mrs. Peacock from the classic boardgame ‘Clue’ in “Shakespeare In A Nutshell.” But it's the cover of Lucinda Williams’ 1980 track “Sharp Cutting Wings (Song For A Poet)” that is really the heart of this collection. Oberst and Williams share a clear musical commonality, both experts at weaving together melancholy and hope. And in fact, following a medical emergency in 2024 when Oberst was battling vocal problems - it was the first thing he wanted to sing after his illness, once he was able to use his voice again. “This was the song I felt like singing,” says Oberst, “I’ve just always loved it.” It was a last-minute addition to the EP that ultimately ties it all together, its cautious optimism offering a glimmer of light in the shadows of the collection, the shadows of a fraying American dream, and the shadows cast across a family dinner at the kids table.
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