Conor Oberst

From a long line of singer-songwriters ominously tagged the "next Bob Dylan", Oberst began recording at 13 as the front man of emo rockers Commander Venus, before adopting the Bright Eyes moniker in 1998. Essentially a solo project, producer Mike Mogis and keyboardist Nate Walcott became permanent members of the band, as their sound progressed from fragile, scratchy, lo-fi folk to grand, orchestra-backed alt. country. Releasing records on Saddle Creek, the label he founded with his brother Justin in 1993, early albums Letting Off Happiness (1998) and Fevers And Mirrors (2000) marked Oberst as a prodigious talent, but the double release of I'm Wide Awake, It's Morning (2005) and Digital Ash In A Digital Urn (2005) on the same day made him a big name in the US. Never afraid to offer a political view, Oberst caused controversy when he played his snarling anti-Bush protest song When The President Talks To God live on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. The brilliant Cassadega album (2007) was followed by records under the name Conor Oberst and the Mystic Valley Band and the formation of supergroup Monsters Of Folk, with Jim James, M Ward and Mike Mogis.