I’m always on the lookout for new music as I frequently look at my iTunes and think, “wow, I’m really tired of this music. Even though I have 16 GB of it sitting in front of me.” A few of the high school students have voiced their enjoyment of the soudns of a band called Owl City. Now, a band with this as their name makes me skeptical to begin with. Rather than spending money on their music only to find out I may or may not like them, I decided that the library could help me make this decision. I checked out 2 of their albums, “Maybe I’m Dreaming” and “Ocean Eyes” and while I’m still forming an exact opinion on whether or not I truly enjoy them, here are some thoughts I’ve had on Owl City.
First of all, I’ve realized this is one guy making this music. Musically speaking, I’m impressed. Granted, he probably has a pretty sweet keyboard that allows him to make all of the beats and strings and all, it still takes a pretty well rounded, musically-minded person to make music such as this.
I also noticed that a man by the name of Matt Theissen had a large hand in the production of these albums. For those who don’t know, Matt Theissen is the lead man of a small band from Canton, OH that you may have heard of…Relient K? When I heard this, I again began to listen differently. Whereas I was thinking to myself, “wow, this person has some good music flowing,” I then thought, “this is still good, but I can absolutely hear the influence here.” Having listened to Relient K (and Matt Theissen and the Earthquakes) since I was in High School, there is a certain flow that runs through his music. Listening through that lens, Owl City definitely has that flow in many of the songs. Not a bad thing by any means, but very interesting.
People have also linked Owl City to the Posal Service. I can see the similarities, but I’m not going to do a disservice to either band by linking the 2 together. I think that every band has influences from many bands and to say that Owl City is a ripoff of the Postal Service is, in a sense, hypocritical.
Where I run into some questions is in the lyrics. From what I’ve heard so far, there’s definitely nothing groundbreaking or terribly “quotable.” It seems like it’s a lot of flowery words used to fit the beat. For instance:
“i get a thousand hugs from 10,000 lightening bugs as they try to teach me how to dance.”
“i’d rather pick flowers than fights.”
It’s no Bono or Ben Gibbard, that’s for sure. But it’s a lot more hopeful than, say, Chris Carrabba of Dashboard Confessional. His newest release has thankfully left the “Screaming Infidelities” girl, but I can’t imagine he’s scrapped that from his set list for live shows. Come on now, let her go. But if this is what people choose to listen to, at least it’s somewhat encouraging and uplifting from what I can tell. Who wouldn’t want to get a thousand hugs from 10,000 lightening bugs as they teach you to dance?? Don’t ask me how that would happen, I think some lightening bugs would be left out, but still.
Before you pass a quick judgement on Owl City, I suggest you at least give them a chance. I can only take so much of them, and I still definitely prefer other bands over them, but I’ll keep them around for a little while. Shuffle them through iTunes here and there.