Conor Oberst is very sorry...

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I'd link the NME news page, but what the heck, you'll guess the contents easy.

(This is in response to his John Peel stage 'headline' set. Nearly wrote "get" there)

― mark grout (mark grout), Thursday, 30 June 2005 08:22 (twenty years ago)

So what did he say?

― James Mitchell (James Mitchell), Thursday, 30 June 2005 10:04 (twenty years ago)

Conor Oberst is in a funny mood. After being bumped up to the headline slot tonight due to Ryan Adams' dodgy ear infection, he's decided it'd be a foolish idea to try and get all the college rock loving crowd on side, so instead just goes for the tactic of pissing them off mightily.

Every single band who have graced the John Peel stage this weekend have sung the praises of the Radio One daddio. If anyone this weekend ever needed a cheer and wasn't getting it from their music all they had to do was simply give a shout out to Mr Peel or dedicate a song to him, and the crowd would spaz. Oberst decides not to follow the party line. "John Peel was a cokehead. I suppose that's why I like him; we have a lot in common," he hollers across the tent to bemused looks and bewildered silence. Calling our John a druggie? We'll have none of that thank you very much. Irate indie kids pack up their rucksacks and trudge off out into the mud, whist others simply take the heckling route. "You're a dick!" being the most popular call to ring out.

He also takes the piss out of the festival's 'Make Poverty History' campaign, "what am I doing? Making poverty history, that's what kids... This next song is definitely going to make poverty history. Poverty – you're fucked!" The man may have a point, lovely as all these wristbands and over keen bands spouting semi-political rhetoric may be, but is a few nice tunes in a field really going to change the minds of world leaders? Either way, that also doesn't go down too well, and yet more people traipse off out.

Shit jokes aside, the only real reason to leave would be due to the fact he plays far more material from his recent 'Digital Ash In A Digital Urn' album, leaving aside the fragile country rock of 'I'm Wide Awake, It's Morning' which last year opened the main stage on Friday morning and got him a whole new set of fans. Many of which he may well have lost tonight.

Leonie Cooper
from www.playlouder.com

― Deluxe (Damian), Thursday, 30 June 2005 10:07 (twenty years ago)

i have to agree with what he said 'bout 'make poverty history' ... biggest joke ever ... just like live 8. sheer amount of homelessness in london ... nobody gives a shit cause it ain't trendy.

MAKE MY POVERTY HISTORY, PAL...

is my response to anyone who has that stupuid fucking byline on his/her email.

― doomie x, Thursday, 30 June 2005 10:16 (twenty years ago)

Why is anyone ever shocked by the fact that Conor Oberst is an immature moron?

― Matthew C Perpetua (inca), Thursday, 30 June 2005 12:22 (twenty years ago)

because he writes those brilliant, moving lyrics?
and, was john peel a cokehead or not?

― joan vich (joan vich), Thursday, 30 June 2005 12:25 (twenty years ago)

No, he wasn't

― DJ Mencap (DJ Mencap), Thursday, 30 June 2005 12:27 (twenty years ago)

thanks.
no that it would change my opinion and my respect for him if he was. i can't stand hypocrisy over drug habits.
(i'm not either, btw!)

― joan vich (joan vich), Thursday, 30 June 2005 12:29 (twenty years ago)

Gosh, I sure am happy that Conor is my generation's Bob Dylan.

What a twit.

― PB, Thursday, 30 June 2005 12:31 (twenty years ago)

He should stop getting drunk every fucking night. Or better yet, get even more drunk and alienate his fan base entirely.

― Ian Riese-Moraine has been xeroxed into a conduit! (Eastern Mantra), Thursday, 30 June 2005 12:41 (twenty years ago)

I imagine, over the years, John Peel would have tried cocaine but I have no idea if he was actually a 'cokehead' or not...

― D.G. Jones (D.G. Jones), Thursday, 30 June 2005 13:17 (twenty years ago)

I don't blame him for making fun of the "Make Poverty History" bit, but dissing a much-beloved and recently dead man to whom your supposed to be paying tribute doesn't make much sense to me.

― Hurting (Hurting), Thursday, 30 June 2005 13:20 (twenty years ago)

Yeah, he should have mentioned how Peel got/gave (depending on who you talk to) the clap to Germaine Greer.

― Dom Passantino (Dom Passantino), Thursday, 30 June 2005 13:29 (twenty years ago)

You guys are backwards in the head. The Peel thing could at least be read as an off-color compliment: "I guess that's why I like him." Playing a charity event and making fun of the potential for charity, on the other hand, is just ridiculous, something like Jamie Foxx standing up at an AIDS benefit and being all like "Hey, I know you're all excited about making a difference and stuff, but actually we're never really going to accomplish much about AIDS." Alternately: wandering around the soup kitchen on Thanksgiving, telling the volunteers not to bother, the homeless people will still be hungry tomorrow.

― nabiscothingy, Thursday, 30 June 2005 14:25 (twenty years ago)

I.e. "I'm too cool and cynical to be okay with people modestly trying to make some tiny, insubstantial positive difference in anything."

― nabiscothingy, Thursday, 30 June 2005 14:27 (twenty years ago)

nabisco: if you've ever worked with or around ACORN organizers, you'll know how irritating the Saul Alinsky model of organizing is, and why it's effect is fleeting, to say nothing of being undemocratic. it's a forest and trees criticism, but i guess it comes down to levels of relative altruism, how good it makes the volunteer feel and what tomorrow looks like for the "beneficiaries" of this sort of "charity".

xpost

― blackmail.is.my.life (blackmail.is.my.life), Thursday, 30 June 2005 14:30 (twenty years ago)

I personally am taking part in the Live8 concert (tangentially, as part of Bjork's backing band for the Tokyo Live8 show) with a full awareness of how easily mocked it all is, but with a sense that on the off chance that enough public support does exert additional pressure on people in a position to effect some kind of tangible change for African people the ratio of risk on my end (deludedly participating in a quixotic distraction) versus the potential benefit for others seems worth taking.

― Drew Daniel (Drew Daniel), Thursday, 30 June 2005 14:37 (twenty years ago)

xpost to drew: if people came for political reasons first and the entertainment factor were secondary, i think it would have a greater impact. if anything i think it trivializes the last round of violent G8 talks in Genoa, and that Bob Geldof has found a means to interrupt a contentious political event with a slate of celebrities, globalizing a Western, messianic cult with no real idea of what democracies should do.

as a philadelphian, there's been no meaningful coverage of the politics and no further explanation why this is happening now, etc.

i do understand your personal explanation - there's no real penalty for artist participation - and you're not making a vote or die! statement personally.

xpost to nabisco: i think that the definition of cynicism has been perverted by the most cynical among us; is it more cynical to criticize an event that seeks to capitalize on global poverty in the flimsy guise of "awareness", or to promote that event in lieu of participating in protests, and encouraging others to do so as well.

― blackmail.is.my.life (blackmail.is.my.life), Thursday, 30 June 2005 14:48 (twenty years ago)

Huh. I think I'm sort of on Conor's side on this one. That feels weird.

I think calling it a "charity event" is disingenuous--it's Glastonbury.

― Eppy (Eppy), Thursday, 30 June 2005 14:51 (twenty years ago)

Call the WAAAAAmbulance, etc although the "what am I doing? Making poverty history, that's what kids... This next song is definitely going to make poverty history. Poverty – you're fucked!" part was awesome.

― Cunga (Cunga), Thursday, 30 June 2005 15:22 (twenty years ago)

Ya know... to a cokehead, the term 'cokehead' isn't an insult. If Conor Oberst had said, "As one of the founding members of Gorilla Biscuit, John Peel was an integral part of the American straight edge hardcore scene. Maybe that's why I think he's a moron," sure, get upset and trudge off into the mud.

― matlewis, Thursday, 30 June 2005 15:37 (twenty years ago)

hahahaha

― latebloomer: now with 20% less cetacean content (latebloomer), Thursday, 30 June 2005 15:53 (twenty years ago)

What was the next song? The one that fucked poverty?

― Justin, Thursday, 30 June 2005 20:46 (twenty years ago)

Wasn't Oberst just snarking at all the bands who might have been mentioning John Peel's name because they felt like they had to, and because it was the easiest cheer they'd get?

but then I wuv him because he is an immature moron.

― spontine (cis), Friday, 1 July 2005 02:30 (twenty years ago)

"Please welcome our headliner for this evening...Brown Eyes!!!"

― Reggie, Friday, 1 July 2005 03:54 (twenty years ago)

.. and his "Ring of fire" song.

― mark grout (mark grout), Friday, 1 July 2005 09:05 (twenty years ago)

Ash's tribute to peel - a midset slowed-down version of 'teenage kicks' and a very subtle glance to the sky from tim wheeler at the end seemed poignant, heartfelt and impossible to be cynical about.
i welled up, and i don't like ash that much.

― piscesboy, Friday, 1 July 2005 09:47 (twenty years ago)

Did I just start to develop respect for Conor Oberst?

Shit.

― jhoshea (scoopsnoodle), Friday, 1 July 2005 11:16 (twenty years ago)

Blackmail it's not a question of the integrity of the event itself; if it's really so vague and pointless, then the easy answer is not to participate in it at all. My issue is with the idea that he'd take the stage and then disparage the concept of the event. It's like going to someone's birthday party to tell them how much they suck -- if you really think so, then just don't go!

― nabisco (nabisco), Friday, 1 July 2005 20:42 (twenty years ago)

Wow, Conor Oberst cynically making fun of poverty relief but he seemed pretty earnest when he was traveling around on John Kerry's behalf last fall. Oh, that's right, he had an upcoming album to promote...yet another tiger changing his stripes as per his marketing schedule.

― flinck, Friday, 1 July 2005 21:17 (twenty years ago)

So he stopped trying to sell records?

― dan. (dan.), Friday, 1 July 2005 21:22 (twenty years ago)

He knows the hype has already subsided, so there's no reason for him to go out of his way to win over anyone.

― bigupalorfrg, Saturday, 2 July 2005 08:29 (twenty years ago)

He was just drunk and grumpy?

― jhoshea (scoopsnoodle), Saturday, 2 July 2005 15:31 (twenty years ago)

The Texas thing and this are so far my only reasons to like this over-precious darling of hurts and boo-boos. Though every dilweed with a middling sense of chord progression and lyrics that rhyme without the use of too many swears gets called our generation's Dylan, to me, angering "adoring" "music fans" is the closest thing to being Dylan-esque this wah wah pedal has done. Mealy mouthed free promo receiving types obviously find him the best and most sincere in the pile of free crap the labels with the cash to promote to the mealy mouths send out. Sort of understandable, but how lines like: "(a) lock of hair you said would prove your love would never die, well hahaha!" got past anyone not like, you know "into cutting" and um, really thinking about applying for a summer internship, but like, also renting a limo for prom, is beyond me. Has our collective desire for pathos in our music reached a point that we will sell short our own dignigty and love of language to soak up its simplistic sniffles? There are options! Van Morrison's Astral Weeks, Leonard Cohen- New Skin for the Old Ceremony, Six Organs of Admittance's A Thousand Birds, Skip Spence's Oar, Phil Ochs' whole catalogue, Gene Clark and Godsin Brothers, Tim Buckley- Happy/Sad: all of this music are filled with complex interpretations of pain and human will in the face of pain that cannot be watered down to cliches, lyrically or musically. My problem with Oberst is more than immaturity, it is an inability to use language and find truth that can only be told outside of verbal cliches. That is why the recent acting out in public gives me hope that somewhere he is fighting against a strictly simplstic path. At very least this dude realizes that a good 67% of the jackasses who turn up their dewy faces to the rollicking sounds of hurty are not music fans so much as they are bobble headed nod-athons who yesyesyes the way the wind blows, the ways the dashboard rocks. Speaking of Dashboard rocks, has anybody seen that guy lately? Boy, a lot of you blinking mickys were touting how much that dude really touched your soul and made the album of the year a while back-- has he already been forgotten!? Yes, becuase he is forgetable, and the music he makes is not what you tout it to be, it is a momentary pop sensation. Oberst seems to genuinely be a musician, although one that makes music that thus far makes me puke, but at least he is alive and thinking and challenging the hypocrisy of a class wealthier and more privilaged than %70 of the world getting all faux-righteous about a cause while getting drunk and totally rocking out, like-- in TRIBUTE man, in SOLIDARITY! Has Conor Oberst too not cowtowed to the ease and softness necessary for a generation of plastic sterility? Well, thank goodness. The only thing that can make good art is challenge, and he has vaguely and perhaps drunkenly, stumbled upon a challege, to his "fans" and to himself. Let's see if now he makes good art.

― Golgotha, Saturday, 2 July 2005 18:45 (twenty years ago)

ten months pass...

i love conor oberst and you all are just freaking out for nothing, they are just words! get over yourselves!

― John Brouillette, Thursday, 4 May 2006 00:21 (twenty years ago)

Well done.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Thursday, 4 May 2006 00:25 (twenty years ago)

Do you have any idea how hard it is to fit "brouillette" into "wrinklepaws"? Have you no heart?

― John Justen (johnjusten), Thursday, 4 May 2006 00:34 (twenty years ago)

http://www.trinity.unimelb.edu.au/tcfs/news/april04/images/words.jpg

― DOQQUN (donut), Thursday, 4 May 2006 00:45 (twenty years ago)

;________________________;

― cws (cws), Thursday, 4 May 2006 01:23 (twenty years ago)

=(_)

=(____)

=(________)

― billstevejim (billstevejim), Thursday, 4 May 2006 14:44 (twenty years ago)

you all are just freaking out for nothing, they are just words! get over yourselves!

Funny, that's exactly what I'd like to tell the Conor Oberst fans of the world about his music.

― Rick Massimo (Rick Massimo), Thursday, 4 May 2006 14:53 (twenty years ago)

Ash's tribute to peel - a midset slowed-down version of 'teenage kicks' and a very subtle glance to the sky from tim wheeler at the end seemed poignant, heartfelt and impossible to be cynical about.

I'm pretty sure I could have given it a go

― DJ Mencap (DJ Mencap), Thursday, 4 May 2006 15:16 (twenty years ago)

Maaan, I knew about this, but I never actually knew exactally what he said, just that he shat on Peel and pissed the fans off.

I must say, pretty fuckin' hilarious on his part, even if it was ill advised.

Also, he's playing here (ottawa, canada) soon, Gruff Rhys from Super Furry Animals is opening, who I'd love to see, but I'm not a big enough fan of B.E. to pay 30 bucsk to see him. And Gruff may not be 30$ worth of good.

Bah.

― Erock Zombie, Thursday, 4 May 2006 23:13 (twenty years ago)

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