One of the things that struck Conor Oberst as he and the band went through twenty-plus years of music is that he may in fact have been writing the same song this whole time. Not sonically, of course, but conceptually. When Bright Eyes toured 2007’s “Cassadaga”, they performed an epic 7 sold-out nights at NYC’s Town Hall. What’s more grown-up rock-star than that? And yet …”thematically those early songs are not that different than the songs I make now,” Oberst says, shaking his head. “There’s something affirming and disheartening about it. It’s like, have I really changed or grown? But maybe it’s just that I knew what I wanted to write about from the beginning”.