Conor Oberst Quotes

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Conor Oberst

Profession : Musician

Birth : February 15, 1980

When I run into a person or a kid that comes up and gives me the spiel about, 'Hey, I got your record at this time in my life, and it really helped me,' that stuff totally still rings true. If you're standing there talking to someone, it's really easy to tell if they're being authentic or not. And that's great.

Conor Oberst

On good days, I can see the inherent goodness in people, and that human beings have a high capacity to learn and adapt. But things like the environment, nuclear weapons and ideas like peak oil - if you think about them too much, they can really freak you out.

Conor Oberst

I kind of go in waves with reading. Sometimes I read all the time, and sometimes I can't get settled enough to focus.

Conor Oberst

I have a terrible memory in general, but one thing I've always been able to remember is my songs.

Conor Oberst

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.

Conor Oberst

When you write a song, the goal is not to convey the details of your life. You should write a memoir or something if that's what you're going to do.

Conor Oberst

I always embrace the worst-case scenario.

Conor Oberst

Considering our history, I can think of nothing more American than an immigrant.

Conor Oberst

I never camped as a kid, but I really got into camping and sleeping outdoors. I've also done some amazing river floats in New Mexico and Idaho. It's peaceful and awesome.

Conor Oberst

I'll write about myself, or people I know, or archetypal characters, but the goal is to get at some truth, not to necessarily convey my own experience as an individual to the world.

Conor Oberst

When you're 16 or 17, I think like most people that age, the first time you experience certain things in life, whether it's heartbreak or death or love, obviously it's going to seem like a much bigger deal.

Conor Oberst

I'm proud that with 'Bright Eyes' we've always experimented and tried to make a different record every time out.

Conor Oberst

My main thing is just to keep writing. I've been doing some songwriting that's for my own record, I suppose.

Conor Oberst

I have many friends who are both Mexican and Mexican-American and others who, I guess you would say, are somewhere in between. The ironic thing is that all three of those categories often exist inside of the same family.

Conor Oberst

I'm very interested in writing - it just takes so much discipline, whether it's short stories or novels.

Conor Oberst

There's a major underlying idea as you grow up that you need to just save your money and get that affordable housing at the edge of town where you're away from the city where all the crime happens or whatever.

Conor Oberst

So much of listening to lyrically driven music is projecting your own feelings and experiences into the music.

Conor Oberst

I like science fiction. Arthur C. Clarke, Philip K. Dick and Vonnegut, and I really like Margaret Atwood, 'The Handmaid's Tale.' And you know, so much of science fiction has to do with predicting what's to come, so I think that's really interesting.

Conor Oberst

I really believe in the way the energy can consolidate in certain geographical spots. You can find it in a lot of different places, beautiful natural spots, or if you look at Islam or Judaism or Christianity, these ideas of holy places.

Conor Oberst

I don't really premeditate what I write my songs about; you know, they just kind of happen, and I can't start writing songs to please a certain group of people or propagate a certain message all the time. That's just not how my songwriting works - it just sort of comes out, and the songs are what they are.

Conor Oberst