Adam Young, a.k.a. Owl City, scored the surprise hit of 2009 with ‘Fireflies’, but the question shrouding new album ‘All Things Bright and Beautiful’ is whether Young can maintain his artful zeal and itchy mixing board fingers after becoming a global success on his last record.
The answer is difficult to explain, for the album serves up much the same formula as its predecessor whilst making occasional stabs at breaking new ground. Young, who created and sold his first two albums independently off the back of viral MySpace promotion before signing to Universal, has produced a record that should satisfy his predominantly youthful following, while continuing to alienate more mature listeners.
To begin to explain, Young’s lyrical style, which some find touching, earnest, tender and insightful in its own charming, guileless way, can equally be described as faux-abstract, pretentious, frivolous, without substance, purulent. Where some thought ‘Fireflies’ contained notable imagery (‘ten million fireflies lit up the world as I feel asleep’), others felt sickened by its relentlessly banal refrains (‘I’d like to make myself believe that planet Earth turns slowly’).
And so no one can envy Young – for all his recent successes a relative novice in the music business, not yet twenty five years old – as he undertakes this follow up, and he involves some friends to help him along; rapper Shawn Chrystopher features on lead single ‘Alligator Sky’, and synthpop princess Lights appears on ‘The Yacht Club’. Joining them is Young’s usual and talented band of collaborators like Breanne Düren, who appeared on his last album.
‘All Things Bright and Beautiful’ kicks off then with ‘The Real World’, a laid-back synth ditty that unfurls like a flowing musical caftan, Young’s usually sub-poetic disposition manifesting itself immediately with the line ‘I saw the autumn leaves peel up off the street, take wing on the balmy breeze and sweep you off your feet’. It is as-expected, the type of song that could quite easily accompany a lazy Sunday shop through Ikea.
Track two, ‘Deer in the Headlights’, is distinctly more musically upbeat, its opening sounds reminiscent of ‘Perfect Symmetry‘-style Keane and followed by a poppy chorus (‘If life was a game you’d never play nice!’). Young is not exactly a pane-shaking chanter, but he channels Tom DeLonge here as opposed to the overly-dreamy musing influence of, say, Ben Gibbard or The Postal Service. Again the lyrics are open to interpretation, but lines like ‘I didn’t know love could shine this bright’ would perhaps be welcomed more by High School prom queens than serious music aficionados.
‘Angels’ is an über-polished and gentle ballad, with an energized-sounding Young screaming ‘Wake me if you’re out there’, while electronics in the background tick along just the right side of ‘memorable’. Indeed, it is ‘Fireflies’-esque in its catchiness, and one wonders why it was not pushed ahead of ‘Alligator Sky’ for lead single – more on that track later.
Perhaps accusations against this reviewer for unduly harsh assertions on lyrical quality are not untoward (though he says: Play it as it lays), but it is difficult to resist quoting; Young enjoys spouting syrupy oxymorons and encomiums the like of ‘Among my frivolous thoughts I believe there are beautiful things seen by the astronauts’ and the almost unbearably more-sensitive-than-thou sentiment, ‘Few of us realise life is quite surreal’. That said, ‘Angels’ is a breathy, dreamy sugarcane of a song, a gold nugget amid sometimes quite prosaic numbers.
‘Dreams Don’t Turn to Dust’ is as forgettable as its title (‘the stars always seem so pretty’ Young asserts), while ‘Honey and the Bee’ is a refreshing break from electronica, featuring a chirpy acoustic guitar and the welcome tuppence-worth of the aforementioned Miss Düren – though the song eventually descends into a rather sugary-sweet series of love notes between both vocalists.
Young is a very able producer, for the tracks here are uniformly stylishly composed, melodious and, on a couple of occasions, infectious. The beats are spunky and soft-edged, with tempos in constant flux and flow, and a mass-market sound; he is very much adept at producing musical sherbet fizz, the sound of spangled confetti being thrown into the air and caught by the wind. At times it is possible to tune out and relax into the songs, while on other occasions one can’t help but feel he has created the record to please as many shiny, happy people as possible.
It is, whichever way you view it, an interesting listen. ‘Kamikaze’ is vaguely reminiscent of ELO and undeniably catchy, with a party flavour. One feels the boat has been missed somewhat, as ‘Kamikaze’ sounds like another contender for single, though it has been usurped in favour of ‘Galaxies’. That is not to say the latter is a weak point – in fact, it is one of the more assured songs on the record, a wonderful, stargazey pop song – almost a perfect pop song, in truth.
However, one wonders why lyrics such as ‘Bring on the breakneck’ and ‘Dubtail the dragnet and blow your backbone to bits’ found their way onto a song that is preceded by ‘January 28 1986’ – a spoken word interlude featuring an excerpt of Ronald Reagan’s speech commemorating the lives lost in the Challenger space shuttle disaster. That the excerpt of Reagan’s regret about that terrible day appears alongside many of Young’s poseur meditations does not do the singer-songwriter much benefit, to be frank.
‘Hospital Flowers’ features somewhat hair-brained lyrics about the victim of a car crash drawing positives from the accident. ‘My burns were third-degree but I’d been set free’ he coos in a whimsical manner, convincing the listener that perhaps Young has spend three or four seconds considering the actual consequences of a devastating car crash, but the ship is steered back on course somewhat with ‘Alligator Sky’, the record’s lead single.
The song has an otherworldly feel about it through the first third, though Chrystopher’s rap gives what otherwise would be a futuristic, dream-embellished tune a distinctly zeitgeist feel. Too often it seems a rapper is employed in a song to give the main artist some semblance of cool. However it is the usual rhyming, artificial fare: ‘I’m a dance like I never dance, sing like I never sing, dream like I never dream’ Chrystopher waffles, while Young’s whitewashed production spangles like frost on a pavement behind the vocals.
The album sweeps to a strange ending with ‘The Yacht Club’, a techno-lite and complexly-arranged harmony duet with Lights, though again the lyrics are very, very elementary: ‘I would rather go swimming with great white sharks than wade in romance, cos I can never find the courage to ask her to dinner or even to dance’ Young pratfalls, at danger of aquaplaning into the realm of simply making it all up as he goes along.
By album’s end the candy is consumed, for each track has the gluey richness of treacle, while lacking the firmament of true taste. The same formula is repeated too often, while attempts at diversity – on ‘Angels’ for example – are unfortunately few and far between. One is encouraged to take a bite, but have a toothbrush ready. Sometimes too sweet is too sour.
(Ronnie McCluskey)
