Secretly Group’s Dead Oceans is the new label partner for the back catalog of veteran indie-rock outfit Bright Eyes, the group has announced. The long-running Indiana-based independent label is now home to all of Bright Eyes’ recordings, a sprawling discography that reaches back more than 20 years — from their 1998 debut, “A Collection of Songs” through 2002 breakthrough “Lifted, or the Story Is in the Soil Keep Your Ear to the Ground” and its 2005 follow-up, “I’m Wide Awake, It’s Morning,” to the last album recorded for the group’s longtime label home, Omaha-based Saddle Creek Records, 2011’s “The People’s Key,” and much more (see the full list below).
Dead Oceans released Bright Eyes’ most recent album, “Down in the Weeds, Where the World once Was” in August of last year. Other artists on Dead Oceans include Japanese Breakfast, Mitski, Khruangbin, Kevin Morby, Destroyer and Phoebe Bridgers, whose 2020 album “Punisher” garnered four Grammy nominations; not coincidentally, she released an album with Oberst in 2019 under the name Better Oblivion Community Center.
Bright Eyes began in 1995 as a recording moniker for then 15-year-old singer/songwriter Conor Oberst’s (pictured above, center) work with producer/multi-instrumentalist Mike Mogis, who with composer/arranger/multi-instrumentalist Nathaniel Walcott (above left and right, respectively), became a fully fledged member in 2006. Over the years the group’s songs have been covered by dozens of artists, including Lorde, the Killers, Mac Miller, Dave Rawlings & Gillian Welch, Phoebe Bridgers, Snow Patrol, Jason Mraz and Beabadoobee.
Dead Oceans’ founder Phil Waldorf says of the acquisition, “Our fandom of Conor’s music began in the earliest days of Bright Eyes, so the opportunity to work with him, Nate and Mike on reissuing their catalog is very special for us. These are classic recordings, and we cannot wait to work closely with Bright Eyes on reissuing and reimagining the catalog in the years ahead. I honestly cannot believe that the Dead Oceans logo will be attached to some of my favorite albums of all-time.”
Bright Eyes on Dead Oceans:
– A Collection of Songs Written and Recorded 1995-1997
– Letting Off the Happiness
– Fevers and Mirrors
– Lifted or The Story Is in the Soil, Keep Your Ear to the Ground
– A Christmas Album
– I’m Wide Awake, It’s Morning
– Digital Ash in a Digital Urn
– Noise Floor (Rarities: 1998-2005)
– Cassadaga
– One Jug Of Wine, Two Vessels (EP with Neva Dinova)
– The People’s Key
– Every Day And Every Night (EP)
– There Is No Beginning To The Story (EP)
– Lua (EP)
– Take It Easy (Love Nothing)
– When The President Talks To God (Single)
– Easy/Lucky/Free (EP)
– Four Winds (EP)
– Coyote Song (Single)
– Singularity (Single)
