[Originally published 8 March 2010. Updated 7 November 2010.]
[Reading a commentary showed me why no one reads commentaries. Writing one showed me why they should be read, if only to see something through eyes other than one’s own.]
(Don’t read this.
Not if you want to keep your perceptions intact concerning any of the existences referenced herein.)
You asked for it (one of you, at least), so here it is. My interpretation of Owl City’s Fireflies, for all who care or are mildly interested, though it would likely be far more appropriate to call this ‘thoughts incurred by Owl City’. I am by no means declaring this the definitive interpretation of what Adam Young means to say; this is merely what I get from the songs, through my deeply tinted lenses. Several of you protested my classification of it as ’emo’. I stand by my word, but it may not be that for you seeing as you are quite a different person from me.
I’m not calling myself a true fan, either – I agree, amazingly, with a particular angered iTunes reviewer – that takes time. I only found out about Owl City a week ago thanks to Thursday Hi-B.A. Godfather and Pandora (which, true, is not available in Japan, but for a price, I do share secrets). I heard The Saltwater Room playing and, quite honestly, hated the sound of it. Ugh, not another acoustic indie whiny voice, I thought. But then I heard the line: If this is what I call home, why does it feel so alone? And that got me. Because I will definitely check out any group that can resound with me so completely and so instantaneously. I listened to more of their (his) songs, among them the much-celebrated Fireflies, which I later learned is his flagship song, but apparently ‘true fans’ like other songs better.
I fell in love with Owl City around this time. I can’t exactly say why, only that his lyrics resonated with me and where I’ve come from. For one, there’s no way he didn’t listen to Relient K during his formative years. I did too, so I don’t mind that tongue-in-cheek rhyme-at-every-corner style, and electronic, well, I’m all for it. In fact, I remember thinking that this was exactly the style I would’ve made if I’d spent more time messing around with Garageband. Clearly, I’m not saying it’s anything deep, profound, or incredibly talented, but it gets me where most other music doesn’t. To put it simply, anything that makes my head do [read the analysis below] is a winner in my book. If I might dare to be so presumptuous, I think this is called inspiration – the gateway to marvels ever greater.
Enough intro. I first intended to do three songs that I particularly like, but after finishing Fireflies, the one I feel I have the best handle on, I decided to call it for now and possibly return later. That’s the one most of you care about anyway, I presume. The others are a little less accessible and, to my over-analytical mind, much more time-consuming.
Now, before any discussion of meaning, it’s important to understand that Adam Young is an insomniac who first began making music in the basement of his house as a diversion during sleepless nights, so nearly all of his songs suffer from overtones of longing for the dream world and everything else that runs through our heads on those long nights. It’s wonderful. He’s snagged two of the greatest figures of imagery, sleep and water, in nearly every song, every line, and I’m a sucker for imagery.
Yes, I do realize that this is far more about me than Adam Young. And I do realize that in just a few years my “interpretation” will very probably be completely different. All I can say is, welcome to the twisted wrought-iron gates through which all external input must pass to reach my innards. I’ve tried to write it in the form of thoughts flitting by as one listens to the song, just like my experience with it, and probably failed, but here you have it. I apologize for the switching of perspective, but when you think about it, it’s only fitting for an analysis of dreams, eh?
I warned you once, I’ll warn you again. If you’re satisfied with your own interpretations of his songs (and several other things) and don’t want to be influenced in any way, go no further. I assure you that, speaking from my own experience, regardless of your opinion of me or the ideas presented throughout this note, there will be at least something you take away that will shade your thinking every time you listen to these songs hereafter.
If you’re fine with hearing other opinions, opinions that, while sounding crazy or convincing, could be very right and very wrong, then read on, read on. Just bear in mind that analysis is painful and, in some cases, mutilates that which is being scrutinized. I hope you can emerge still able to enjoy these songs simply for what they are. I do! (says my already-deranged-beyond-the-ability-to-hold-any-sort-of-‘normal’-interaction mind)
Fireflies
You would not believe your eyes
Because I’ve waited for this moment of falling asleep for so long (who but one with experience can imagine how much an insomniac longs for the comforting arms of sleep, and the escape from harsh reality into fantastic dreams?),
If ten million fireflies
this moment at which I say good-bye to this world and hello to that of dreams, a joyous greeting bursting with light (fireflies are magical, and romantic, what better way to light the passage into long-awaited realms beyond consciousness?),
Lit up the world as I fell asleep.
and because you could not possibly imagine the wondrous things I dream could happen.
‘Cause they’d fill the open air
Freedom.
And leave teardrops everywhere.
Even if you don’t accept ’emo’, surely you must admit that overtones of sadness string through all of his cheery-sounding music, and here is one such instance. Though the light is beautiful and healing, in its wake is left cold, real tears – each dream reflective of some real-life sorrow. To be blunt, I submit that each firefly is a unique dream, and each tear some instant within each dream that sticks with us through waking, making us long for something we can’t quite put our finger on.
You’d think me rude
But I would just stand and stare.
Observers – that’s all any of us really are in our dreams, isn’t it? Barring a few rare cases, we have no power, we can only watch strange events unfold and, just when we’re most glad we’re above and not within these horrible happenings, be plummeted into the passenger seat and swept along in them. Someone watching us play these parts in our own dreams might wonder what we’re thinking, how we could possibly be making these choices. We’d be more than rude. But choice is an illusion – in the dream world.
I’d like to make myself believe
In the dream world, it is not fact that matters but what we believe, consciously, subconsciously, or unconsciously.
That planet Earth turns slowly.
Because then the sun’s rays would be delayed, the night would stretch a little further. There’d be time to sleep, to reach the dream world, and to see the story to its conclusion, rather than be rudely pulled away to a groggy mind and impatiently expectant new day.
It’s hard to say that I’d rather stay
Awake when I’m asleep,
It’s so easy to stay awake, eh? We hold our eyes open doing who knows what, wasting time, like I most likely am right now, and never fail to regret it in the morning. However, when we finally acquiesce to the bidding arms of sleep, or, in some cases, the reluctant embrace of sleep, we don’t regret and we see what we were missing out on.
‘Cause everything is never as it seems.
Because we never know what’s good for us until we’re force-fed it, and even then we’re slow to return after scampering away foolishly once again. But when pure grandeur is staring one in the face, it’s nigh unto impossible to turn one’s back – the truth speaks for itself when superficiality is torn away.
‘Cause I’d get a thousand hugs
Someone cares,
From ten thousand lightning bugs
even if it’s only the illusion of hopes attained, voids filled, life fulfilled,
As they tried to teach me how to dance.
because I believe there’s a better life to be grasped if only I knew how – how to dance the dance, how join in the magic that binds what is to what could and should be.
A foxtrot above my head,
[I am just about the least qualified person to comment on this section, because I couldn’t tell the difference between a waltz and a salsa, and have no desire to be able to, but Wikipedia and YouTube do shed some light in cases such as this. The ‘foxtrot’, a ballroom dance, emerged in the early 1900s and for the first half of the century was the most popular fast dance, being fitted to all different types of lively music, ranging from ragtime to disco and even some rock and roll.]
Note that it’s a pair dance.
A sock hop beneath my bed,
[A ‘sock hop’ is not a particular style but an event – an informal sponsored dance at American high schools, usually in the gym or cafeteria. Its hay-day was in the 1950s; now we simply call it ‘a dance’, unless of course you’re from CAJ, in which case you’re more accustomed to the word ‘banquet’, with quite a different mental image. For a shockingly in-your-face demonstration of the general structure and reason for its demise, get a load of <a href=”http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ENn6v5S_Sk”>this</a>. Blech. Okay, sorry, back to the reverie.]
The sock hop needs no partner, simply a moderately uninhibited group or a very uninhibited individual. Might I point out that while the sock hop could represent general sociality, which he certainly seems to be wishing for, it is relegated to beneath the bed, whereas the pair dance takes place above. There’s one who stands out in his mind from the rest.
A disco ball is just hanging by a thread.
But this exhibition of youthful frolicking spanning the decades could so quickly come crashing down, for it hangs on the thread of belief, of dreams of something better…
I’d like to make myself believe
That planet Earth turns slowly.
…if only I had time to find that something better before morning.
It’s hard to say that I’d rather stay
Awake when I’m asleep,
Sleep is grateful for itself, which cannot always be said of wakefulness. Upon awaking we may wish for or regret the false fulfillment of dreams, but for the duration of that sleep the dream was fulfilled, with a promise of more to come in just a bit – if we could only, the next time, find our way back!
‘Cause everything is never as it seems
Sadly yes, the achievements and acquisitions of the dream world are limited to just that, and slip away quicker than the haze from our eyes on the pillow – or is it that in reality we are closer to the realization our dreams than we realize? Nothing is ever as it seems, after all,
When I fall asleep.
in that peculiar moment (of traveling among worlds).
Leave my door open just a crack
There must be some escape from this prison of darkness, the bars being either my eyelids or the blank bedroom walls, even if it means denying what I so desperately need and venturing back through the known and futile to any sort of diversion from my deepest physical and emotional needs/wishes so clearly not being fulfilled [remember the basement, making music to pass the sleepless time, thing].
(Please take me away from here)
However, the preferred route by far is not down the stairs but up into the clouds of rest and fantastic wonderment.
‘Cause I feel like such an insomniac.
(Please take me away from here)
Here it is, flat out, what is wrong with me?
Why do I tire of counting sheep
Any desperate measure to get to that place
(Please take me away from here)
When I’m far too tired to fall asleep?
failing in the face of a barrier transcending logic and physical necessity, laughing at suffering, dragging on…and on. How could I not be asleep by now?
<rueful snicker>
To ten million fireflies
Dream-filled sleep cycles (or perhaps half-awake dreams of sleep?) pull away as another bright morning dawns far too early.
I’m weird ’cause I hate goodbyes.
Why is it that though everyone dislikes parting words, they all still insist on going through with them, and the strange one is he who refuses to observe these empty and petty traditions? But some of us know the pain of said and unsaid good-byes a little better than others, and hate them a little more. [This is the line in this song, similar to that one in The Saltwater Room, that “had me at hello” – this line would have been enough to make the song, for me.] But the fireflies, the dreams, promise to return – what’s to hate about this moment? What’s so hard about “good-bye”? It’s only ever “see you later”. We tell ourselves.
I got misty eyes as they said farewell.
So that’s where that crusty gunk on my eyes when I wake up comes from – the dried tears cried at the departure of my dreams, or rather my departure from them for my day-job. As good as dreams are, we’re forever separated just before the good part, the climax, the happy ending.
But I’ll know where several are
I won’t let go.
If my dreams get real bizarre,
What could be more bizarre than a dream becoming reality? Not all, but for some dreams, especially their undertoned promises, that is the final goal. And it could happen yet,
‘Cause I saved a few and I keep them in a jar.
because I keep a firm grip on them as I come crashing down through the misty layers of waking, and they do not escape my mind as I proceed through the day, for though they’re far from the present, they’re very close to some distant future, close to being set free on this side of the clouds.
I’d like to make myself believe
That planet Earth turns slowly.
And that it’s not rushing towards disaster, spiraling downwards, but gravitating upwards. It all takes time – do I have enough time? Certainly none to waste.
It’s hard to say that I’d rather stay
Awake when I’m asleep,
Because my sleep is so good, but could it be that the time awake could hold some promise comparable to the joy of dreams? Could the one actually be experienced in the other – pure, unbridled joy in achievement – and actually seen through to the end?
‘Cause everything is never as it seems
The morning should be glorious, and welcomed, not dreaded for the fear of what it bears tidings of, or lack of spirit to survive another cycle. Still, there’s no denying that ultimate triumph comes not in the world of the night but in the day. We just have to find that way to merge the undeserved fulfillment of dreaming with the reality of choice, and taste success amidst our human weakness. Is this possible?
When I fall asleep.
When I no longer have to fight my selfish self.
I’d like to make myself believe
That planet Earth turns slowly.
Surely this isn’t too much to ask, when once it stood still.
It’s hard to say that I’d rather stay
Awake when I’m asleep,
But for you, I’d stay awake forty days and forty nights. For you, I’d stay awake all night.
‘Cause everything is never as it seems
When I fall asleep.
What, is, this, love?
I’d like to make myself believe
Please.
That planet earth turns slowly.
We would have time.
It’s hard to say that I’d rather stay
Awake when I’m asleep,
There is time, not because I’ll hold myself awake, but because there is outside of time (everything is never as it seems).
Because my dreams are bursting at the seams.
It is possible, because ultimately and fortunately we are not the ones in control of realizing that success, only the blessed players in this waking dream. However, this merging will not come by a forceful sewing together of opposites on old seams, but by a rending, a curtain torn from top to bottom, a bursting open, an explosion of furious opposites weaving together in flight, a new scheme, to create a breathtaking panorama of real-AND-happy-ending-story, like fireflies in evergreens against the dark blue starry sky.
[And this is why I fell in love with Owl City. You could say, “You don’t love them, you only love your own ideals,” and I would reply, yes, but certain things remind forgetful me of them.]
Inspiration's Waiting Room 