I’m Wide Awake It’s Morning

by editor Michele Catalano

It’s 2020, we are in the midst of the pandemic, locked down in our houses, our workplaces closed. My then-husband buys me a turntable to give me something to do with my time. 

I have a litany of albums that take me through those treacherous times—new albums by Soccer Mommy and Ratboys, old albums I’ve accumulated through the years like Aztec Camera’s High Land Hard Rain and Joe Jackson’s Look Sharp. These albums buoy me, make me feel comfort when I need it most. It’s Bright Eyes’ I’m Wide Awake It’s Morning that really permeates my heart, that gets me through some awful times, globally and personally. I go right from the pandemic to my husband walking out on me while I ams still reeling from the aftereffects of COVID. I feel so alone, so helpless, and, worse than alone, lonely. I listen to Wide Awake endlessly, letting each song wash over me, take me somewhere else, yet keep me grounded.

I came to Bright Eyes late; it was early in the pandemic when I borrowed my son’s copy of Cassadaga and fell in love with Conor Oberst’s songwriting. I moved on to Fevers and Mirrors, then Lifted. “Lover I Don’t Have to Love” convinced me that Oberst was not only the greatest living songwriter, but the most emotional vocalist out there. The passion that comes through when he sings entrances me, makes me a believer in all of his words.

I eventually moved on to I’m Wide Awake, It’s Morning. If I hadn’t been a Bright Eyes fan before hearing this, it surely would have sold me immediately. Every song is a tour de force. Every lyric carefully measured, every note intense. 

It starts off with Oberst speaking, telling a story about strangers on a plane that’s crashing, which leads into “At the Bottom of Everything.” I was so taken by the poetry of it, by the lilting lyrics, by Conor’s plaintive singing. I knew I was in for something special.

“Lua” into “Train Under Water” into “First Day of My Life” is an adventure. Whereas “Lua” breaks my heart, “First Day of My Life” settles it down. In between, “Train Under Water” buoys me; the lilting melody, the singalong verses, make me forget there’s a breakup within, at least for a few moments. When you are going through the ending of a long relationship, every song is a breakup song. That feeling I got listening to the album for the first time seemed fortuitous, as if I tripped and fell into it. I accepted the fate that brought me there.

“First Day of My Life” is a love song; a passionate, desperate love song. A song that goes beyond simple proclamations to describe a more urgent love. A song that makes me feel my loneliness acutely.

This is the first day of my life

I’m glad i didn’t die before i met you

I think about the things he used to say to me, and my heart breaks all over again to know that those deep, passionate words whispered in my ear mean nothing; not like this couple in the song who are so obviously meant for each other. They aren’t each other’s dream partners, but they make do.

I am at the stage of acceptance in my divorce grief, and I know I have to accept other people having what I want, having words that are intentional and true whispered at them. I cry, and cry some more, and continue with the album because I know catharsis is coming. I get through “Land Locked Blues,” a sad song whose words clang around in my heart, constantly making noise when I want quiet. Yet I listen. Because Conor’s voice, his affectation, holds so much power over me. His is an earnest voice. He sings like every word is true. Every lyric comes from deep within his soul, and as he’s articulating his feelings, he’s exhaling, letting the words drop out and clatter on the floor, where I am left to pick them up and put myself back together.

But it’s “Ode to Joy” that brings me the catharsis I’m looking for. Everything else is bleak, sad, hard. But here? Here we let it out. Here we scream. Here we empty ourselves of our grief and loneliness. 

The sun came up with no conclusions

Flowers sitting in their beds

The city’s cemetery’s humming

I’m wide awake it’s morning

Conor sings those words with something bordering on anger and despair. Yet there’s a ray of hope inside those words, inside his voice, that tells me everything is going to be okay. I’m going to have to work for it, but everything will be okay. I just have to let it be okay. 

There’s that catharsis, there’s the letting go. There is Conor Oberst, singing just for me.