By: Zach Adler / April 12, 2024
All photographs by Zach Adler
When Conor Oberst announced a four-night weekly residency at Los Angeles' Teragram Ballroom spanning every Thursday in March (as well as a subsequent residency in April at New York's Bowery Ballroom) promising different setlists, openers, and backing bands each night, I immediately had one thought: this is either going to be miraculous or an absolute trainwreck. Oberst has long been an onstage performer capable of delivering catharsis and transcendence from his vast catalog now spanning over a quarter century, but he could just as easily fall back into the alcohol-induced pitfalls from lengthy tours, including the last Bright Eyes tour, and land flat on his face. The idea of having so many different balls in the air with its rotating cast to adapt to and a promise of wide-ranging surprises only led to more questions. Who would show up? What would he play? And could he keep his head above water week in and week out?
NIGHT ONE
After an introduction from Oberst himself, his longtime friend, and current Bright Eyes bassist MiWi La Lupa took the stage for the first opening set, followed by none other than M. Ward.
Throughout the main set, it felt very much like Oberst wanted to set the parameters for how this residency would go. Though an abundance of music stands filled with sheet music and lyric sheets dotted the stage with the setlist established by the band’s musical director, that intentional plotting allowed the band to take more risks in terms of material.
Mystic Valley Band’s “Sausalito” kicked things off with a burst of country rock flair that pervaded the set, which also included Upside Down Mountain highlight “Hundreds of Ways” and absolute rager in the singalong "I Don't Want to Die (in the Hospital)" from his 2008 self-titled solo album that closed the main set. "Man Named Truth" from Oberst and Ward's collaboration (along with Bright Eyes' Mike Mogis and My Morning Jacket's Jim James) Monsters of Folk was appropriately rocking, while I’m Wide Awake It’s Morning’s “We Are Nowhere and It’s Now” was reworked not just according to the companion EP arrangement, but even further as a duet between Oberst and Ward.
The big surprise however, came with the slower songs. While Upside Down Mountain’s swooning “Night at Lake Unknown” was a solid contender, it was the Bright Eyes deep cut “Trees Get Wheeled Away” that was one of the highest points of the night. It was also exciting to have Oberst take to the piano for the back-to-back Ruminations highlights "Tachycardia" and "Gossamer Thin." Both were appropriately shaggy for an album so full of raw emotion, with La Lupa being the only accompanist.
This strong setlist, heavy on very unexpected deep cuts, was balanced out by an encore heavy on familiar numbers. After a solo acoustic cover of fellow Midwest heroes The Replacements' "Here Comes a Regular" to begin the encore, the night ended on an electric high point with a pulverizing one-two punch of "The Calendar Hung Itself..." and "Easy/Lucky/Free," sending the crowd out singing along in emo reverie.
Walking out of the first night completely enraptured, I knew I had to be there for every moment of the run. These shows were going to be truly momentous.
NIGHT TWO
With night two quickly approaching, would getting in despite not even having a tickey happen? I was praying that something would come up, checking Ticketmaster every 30 seconds after I got off work, wading through the meander of traffic to the Teragram only on faith. It would take until the moment of most suspense, the dreaded 101/110 merge in the heart of Downtown Los Angeles, but I managed to snag one.
After Leslie Stevens' opening set, the applause came not for Oberst but for his musical right-hand Nate Walcott, who led the band in a 10-minute jazz/Tropicalia jam. Oberst didn't even appear onstage during this opening jam, letting the band, including ace jazz guitarist Jeff Parker, bassist Anna Butters, and saxophonist Josh Johnson, all establish themselves sonically. Walcott clearly wanted to push Oberst into more daring and experimental territory, exploring both the lusher textures of Bright Eyes’ sound and deeper corners of Oberst’s songbook.
We got some wild Bright Eyes cuts like Lifted’s “Laura Laurent,” Fevers and Mirrors’ “Arienette,” and The People’s Key’s “Ladder Song” and “Approximate Sunlight,” as well as the first two songs to pop up from Down in the Weeds Where the World Once Was, “Just Once in the World” and the poignant album/main set closer “Comet Song.” "Barbary Coast (Later)" adopted the sweep of the Salutations arrangement, which hit with a poignancy I'd never particularly felt from that arrangement.
Throughout the set, the normally stoic Walcott was clearly having a great time, serving as bandleader through his own idiosyncratic guided tour of his musical soulmate’s vast work. When he wasn’t banging the hell out of his keyboards, his infamous trumpet breaks would fill the room and receive swells of applause, as well as often a well-placed sax harmony from Johnson.
The encore was also excellent, consisting of a lovely duet with Stevens on the one-off single “LAX,” a joyous reading of “A Little Uncanny” that featured both a great guitar solo from Parker and Oberst’s only serious lyric flub of the night, and a gorgeous, heartstring-pulling rendition of “A Song to Pass the Time.”
NIGHT THREE
Two down, two to go. Night two had been even more exciting than the first, and with the number of possibilities for choices of songs and guests still pretty wide, anticipation from the crowd was still very high.
But once again I still didn’t have a ticket, and it seemed that the Ticketmaster well had run dry. This one would have to require a lot more faith.
For those who don’t know, there’s a bit of a meme in the Grateful Dead community, which has expanded into the larger concertgoing public, of the miracle. Playing off the Dead’s 1978 song “I Need a Miracle,” it became a rallying cry for Deadheads who didn’t have tickets to the show but showed up anyway and through luck and the generosity of others, is given a ticket usually right in front of the venue and for face value. It’s a practice that doesn’t always work, but when it does, feels great.
I was going in looking for a miracle to top the good luck I’d had the week before. I walked the line many times, often trying to lock eyes with the right person who might have a spare. It would end up taking a couple of hours, but with 20 minutes before the opener, I got in - miracle secured.
The opening sets from Mystic Valley Band collaborator Nick Freitas and Oberst’s on-and-off collaborator and onetime girlfriend Maria Taylor were well-spirited, with Frietas telling the story of how he first met Oberst and was asked to support him.
These two were part of a much larger band than even the Walcott-assembled second night, featuring both a pair of violins and a trio of backup singers. And the band immediately meant business, launching in with a truly fantastic rendition of the classic “An Attempt to Tip the Scales.” It sounded absolutely massive, bolstered by Taylor’s drumming, Stefanie Drootin’s bass, and Orenda Fink taking the Walcott slot on trumpet.
It’s hard to overstate just how much of the perfect night this was in terms of a setlist attuned to the large “family band” format. People’s Key once again almost stole the night with a rollicking “Jejune Stars.” Down in the Weeds highlights “Mariana Trench” and “Forced Convalescence” both brought the house down thanks in part to Oberst’s impassioned dancing. The back-to-back rockers "NYC-Gone, Gone" and "Souled Out!!!" were excellent, with the deep cut “Southern State” serving as a powerful exclamation point.
Given Oberst's tendency for the first two nights to put the most well-known songs in the encores, it felt like a decent expectation that he would save perhaps the definitive song of his career for the very end of the residency. But to put “First Day of My Life” in this sequence after Cassadaga's "Make a Plan to Love Me" and the deep cut "I Won't Ever Be Happy Again," both songs that play with the little specks of romantic hope in the bleakness of romantic desolation (as well as a brutal “Poison Oak” played earlier in the set), it felt like he was asserting that hope with dogged, almost tortured persistence. "First Day" is a song that Oberst has spent the last twenty years with, continually finding new depths to plumb from it. This time, it was Mike Bloom’s pedal steel and the twin violins of Tiffany Osborn and Hannah Murray that served as Oberst’s romantic buoy as he howled and lurched through his declarations undying of love.
What filled me with anticipation for most of night three was not what was played, but something onstage that wasn't. I knew the all-black acoustic guitar far off at stage right and whose it was. For both openers and the entirety of the main set it sat completely untouched, patiently waiting for its owner to take the stage. Then Oberst wandered onstage hiding a tiny grin on his face, knowing what he would say would make the Teragram erupt in more feverish applause than any other moment all month.
“I would like to introduce to you one of my favorite people on planet Earth. All the way from Pasa-dangerous, California in the flesh here she is, Phoebe Bridgers.”
And onstage walked Bridgers, not in the mode of one of the biggest stars in indie music, but as the old Phoebe, the one who if you were at the right show in LA and were mingling in the right spot at the venue, you could bump into and feel special talking to for even a brief minute.
With some comments made onstage by Bridgers at a show in Scotland with Better Oblivion co-writer Christian Lee Hutson last August, it seemed like BOCC was done, bound to be a lost era for both members of the duo as Bridgers continued her march to mainstream stardom and Oberst recommitted to Bright Eyes. But there they were onstage together, nothing but smiles. It was like no time had passed and the whole room was back in 2019, when it seemed like we were witnessing something truly special.
The three-song encore began with a truly devastating reading of "Lua," another one of the towering achievements of heartbreak from I'm Wide Awake It's Morning, delivered with soul-shattering precision by Bridgers. Still beaming, Bridgers picked up her guitar and the two went into BOCC's "My City," the album's dearest tribute to Los Angeles. Joined by the full band for the finale of "Double Life," the only Upside Down Mountain song on a night more dominated by Bright Eyes songs than any in the residency, the two sounded once again at the head of this great musical beast.
Back when BOCC played the a two-night stand at the Teragram, including a second night exactly five years to the day before night two of Oberst's residency, Bridgers told a story onstage of how in her high school days, people would shout in jest, "is this the line for the Conor Oberst fan club" as they passed her, knowing how much of a devotee of his she was. With that encore, she rejoined her kin in this celebration of the man.
NIGHT FOUR
After the monumental end to night three, the feeling was that the fourth night had to leave things off on a massive high note.
The only hiccup was that, like weeks two and three, I didn’t have a goddamn ticket. It would take another miracle to get in. Thankfully, on my third lap walking the line in search of a miracle who also makes their own music as Okay Alright (go out and stream their music) was generous to get me in on a complete comp. So, I was in, ready to see what Oberst had in store for this grand finale.
Night four was almost as much about the band as it was about Oberst. With Bright Eyes’ own Mike Mogis on bass, Bridgers’ guitarist Harrison Whitford on lead guitar, The Felice Brothers’ James Felice on keys, and legendary session drummer Jim Keltner behind the drum kit, it was a band to be reckoned with. Mogis had been shouted out onstage on night three, giving rise to the idea that the finale might just be a full-on Bright Eyes show.
It could not have felt like a more momentous occasion with the presence of Keltner's drumming. For those unaware, Keltner is perhaps one of the most lauded drummers of all time, with a truly dizzying session resume including records by all four solo Beatles, Bob Dylan, Neil Young, Joni Mitchell, Fiona Apple, Dolly Parton, Randy Newman, The Beach Boys, Willie Nelson, Steely Dan, Tom Petty, Elvis Costello, Jenny Lewis, Warren Zevon, Leonard Cohen, Harry Nilsson, The Traveling Wilburys, Jackson Browne, Ry Cooder, and many, many more. He is THE guy. Seeing him play those drums with the power, grace, and style of a true master, always in seemingly effortless control reading the feel of all the other players, was a big moment. Few others could manage to wrangle someone of Keltner's stature for a one-off gig, but Oberst, eager to call Keltner one of his good friends (Keltner silently nodded when Oberst asked if that was okay), just went to show the connection the two had was clear.
Whitford was also at the very top of his game. Having seen him perform both Bridgers’ music and his own, he’s usually one to lean into more nuanced, textured playing with the occasional knotty solo similar to his peers Meg Duffy and Blake Mills. But onstage with Oberst, wielding a hefty Les Paul, he was all for blazing guitar heroics.
Mogis was also having a hell of a time.
The band’s focus was largely on 2017’s Salutations, for which Keltner served as co-producer and drummer and Felice had played keyboards on. Songs from Salutations and Ruminations had been prevalent in the first two nights, and no other album other than Fevers and Mirrors had seen as much attention. Fortunately, that batch of songs is really, really great. Songs like “Overdue” and “Too Late to Fixate” sound great live, especially with genuine curveballs like the despondent “Lonely at the Top” and the sublime “Cape Canaveral” peppered in between. The two best songs came when Oberst sat down at the piano beach for the album’s highlights “Next of Kin” and “Till St. Dymphna Kicks Us Out.” On “St. Dymphna” in particular, the band was able to capture the wobbly drunken triumph of the bare Ruminations demo that sometimes sounds a bit too slick on Salutations.
Oberst returned to the piano at the beginning of the encore to deliver a deservedly aching rendition of Salutations’ title track before putting a button on the residency with “Mamah Borthwick (A Sketch)” and a pounding, screeching “Napalm” that served as another chance for Whitford to really rip.
Was the goal of night four an attempt to establish Ruminations and Salutations as essential pieces of Oberst’s catalog? Was it just a good opportunity to get Keltner in the room? Perhaps it was just a chance for Felice, serving as the week’s musical director, to play a lot of the album that he had a hand in. Whatever it was, it served for a damn good night to close out the residency not on its highest note, but one of its most assured.
In conversation with longtime Oberst fans present at the shows, many who have been following him for more than a decade, the consensus has been clear that these have been some of the most magical performances of his career. Across over 60 different songs with four wildly different bands, he showed once again how vital he is as both a songwriting force and as a live performer.
Zachary Adler is a Los Angeles-based music writer and fan, record collector, and budding social butterfly. When not at a show, sifting through bins at a record store, or haunting the sixth row of the New Beverly Cinema, he probably can’t be found. There are only so many hours in the day. His music criticism can be read at @zachsrecordcrate on Instagram, and his scene reports can be read in the print edition of Sid the Cat Magazine.
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