Letting Off the Happiness: A Companion

“For all intents and purposes, I feel like that\'s our debut album,” Oberst says of November 1998\'s *Letting Off the Happiness*, the band’s second LP and first to be produced by Mogis. “I think it\'s kind of special, because it\'s when Michael and I realized that we were going to work together for a long time. Climbing up, getting towards the top of what was going to become a pretty wild ride.” It was with this record that Oberst started exploring the ways in which punk and folk could coexist—a direction that combined elements of everything he was surrounded by in Omaha. “There was this sort of union of punk and folk things happening simultaneously in Nebraska when I was growing up,” he says. “My singing style was the whole jumping an entire octave, but that was not a decision that was made out of any kind of aesthetic or plan. We played in such shitty rooms that you had to scream to be heard over the people and the terrible PA that we were using. So I learned to just jump up an octave if you want people to hear what you\'re saying.” It was that vocal volatility that became a focal point for the album, one that helped define Oberst’s early style of singing and Mogis’ layered approach to production. “We made half of it in my parents’ laundry room on his 8-track little machine,” Oberst says. “And then we went down to Athens, Georgia, and made the rest of it with our friend Andy LeMaster, who had just built a kind of real studio. It felt like we were really doing something, even though I didn\'t know what it was at the time. I feel like that was the beginning of the band, actually. Even though I was still in high school, I knew that something was going to change after that record. Maybe there was some sort of anticipation. I felt like I was entering into a different level of making music compared to all the stuff I had done up to that point.” The companion EP to *Letting Off the Happiness* provides updated takes on a few of the original songs, with two features from Waxahatchee and one from longtime collaborator M. Ward on \"Kathy With a K\'s Song\" (first included on *Oh Holy Fools - The Music of Son, Ambulance and Bright Eyes*), plus a cover of Elliott Smith’s “St. Ides Heaven” with added vocals from Phoebe Bridgers. Oberst’s choice for “St. Ides Heaven” serves as an homage to Smith and reflects his immense admiration for his music. “I love Elliott Smith, but I actually I\'ve been hesitant to cover his music just because it’s really important to me and when I hear people cover Elliott Smith songs, I usually don\'t like it because I\'d rather have him do it,” he says. “But this one was so drastically different. I was like, \'Let\'s just make it so not even in his zone at all.\' I actually hurt my voice screaming that part, and I love the song. And I don\'t know. After it all went down, I couldn\'t even really listen to him for like years, so it\'s nice to sing one of his songs again.”