Oberst’s Eyes and his future are bright

The curtain behind Bright Eyes leader Conor Oberst glowed as red as the young songwriter’s tender heart on Wednesday, as his group launched its Henry Fonda Music Box Theatre show with a new song melding personal vignettes into a commentary on how war overshadows everyday life -- in ways as mundane as children play-battling with sticks, as extraordinary as a couple making love while images of invasion flash across their TV screen.

On this sold-out first of two nights at the Fonda, the 22-year-old Omaha-based singer-guitarist performed several new tunes with a backing quintet, instead of the 13-piece ensemble he brought to the same venue last October.

The smaller group made the 90-minute set more immediate, less sweepingly dramatic, but the players still produced rich textures with guitar, pedal-steel, banjo, organ, bass, drums and vibraphone. Some numbers recalled late-period Camper Van Beethoven with their sprawling, world-country-folk feel and personal-political lyrical tapestries, but other tunes had a punk quality a la Oberst’s more rock-oriented group Desaparecidos.

The new material fit the obliquely confessional, emotionally literal style of selections from 2002’s acclaimed “Lifted, or the Story Is in the Soil, Keep Your Ear to the Ground” and earlier Bright Eyes works. But they revealed Oberst’s growing confidence and skill, better integrating his individual frustrations and fears about love, current events and art versus career with a broader sense of righteousness that marks him as a future galvanizing force -- not just for his generation, but for pop music as well.

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Bright Eyes

Where: Glass House, 200 W. 2nd St., Pomona

When: Tonight, 7 p.m.

Price: $15

Contact: (909) 629-0377