Hey there! I’ve put this here for more of my own reference so I can be reminded of the meanings behind the Owl City songs. Again, these are a mix of my and others’ interpretations to each of Adam’s lovely songs.

I’d love to hear back from you about my Meanings page! Do you like the page? Is there an interpretation you’d like to submit? If so, go for it! Do you see an error? Whatever it may be, go on and send a message! :)

NOTE: I’m not overly religious (so I’m not biased) but I’ve tried to put things into Adam’s perspective, looking at it from a religious point of view as well as other POVs. Surprisingly a lot of songs can be looked at from a religious point of view, and that’s what I feel Adam’s trying to get at for a majority of songs whether it be as bluntly stated as “Meteor Shower” or subtle like in “This Is the Future.”

The Airway

“I can see you above with the ocean around me…in love on the airway.”

I think this song is about someone he loves who he’s now out of touch with. Things didn’t work out and he can see her slipping away right before his eyes, and he’s just not ready for it. And she doesn’t notice that he wants her back, she ignores him. So “the airway” is the distance between them. And he wishes they were in love, instead of the distance, which refers to “in love in the airway”.

Air Traffic:

“The bird is here and we are off to wherever those wings may take us…”

Adam is referring to an airplane when he says ‘bird.’

“Relax your back and let the noise sing you to sleep in my arms…”

This relates to the plane’s sound and Adam’s insomnia.

“The false veneer is old like a substitute volunteer from oh some other year…”

False veneer is the fake wood boarding on the inside of airplanes.

“The silver beams are twirling and swirling throughout your dreams like air traffic streams…”

Dreams are open and limitless.

Alligator Sky:

Adam stated in an interview, “There’s no way to predict what’s coming your way, whether it be a good day, or a bad day, or a crazy, bizarre, weird day. All the more reason to take whatever comes head-on.” The interviewer then said: “Okay, so, take it all head-on, you never know what’s gonna happen, much like an alligator falling from the sky and eating you.” And Adam answered with, “That’s basically it!” [submitted by justwanttoruntoyou]

“Sing like I never sing, dream like….the sun is something that we can’t fly to.”

Consider the saying ‘the sky’s the limit.’ he is stating not to set a limit that low.

“Where was I when the rockets…and carried you away into the alligator sky?”

Alligators are often something people fear, so maybe when he mentions an “alligator sky” he is saying that sometimes are goals will be frightening, and hard to beat. But we need to keep going, and we can all meet in the alligator sky, where we all have reached our greatest potential at the end of our lives.
Aka, heaven.

The line “where was I when the rockets came to life?” Could also be looked at as the ressurection of Jesus and then “carried you away into the alligator sky” could be the ascension of Jesus.

“I’m scared to death that  I’ll never be afraid…”

His imagination can also be used to simply envision a better future for himself, and to work towards achieving it. He’s extremely apprehensive, but he knows it’s an inevitable emotion and he’s ready to blast off.

Angels

Adam mentioned about this song, “The song Angels is a bit of a spiritual, injected song. It says a lot about the fact, or kind of the idea, that there might be angels really around us. And the song talks about someone who is sort of seeing these surreal out of nowhere traces of what might be an angel. And playing to the fact that what if you could sort of pick a time and a place to meet up with one of them or somehow have contact with them. Just the idea of that by itself is interesting to me. And the idea of angels by itself.. It’s like, you can’t study them, you can’t physically read about them. So they can be anything to anybody and that’s an interesting way of looking at things.”

“I’ve been sleeping with the nightlight….so wake me if you’re out there.”

Adam doesn’t need the nightlight because he is safe in his imagination.

“Living close to the ground is seventh…astronauts.”

There are more beautiful things seen in space, which is referring to people who ‘have their head in the clouds.’

“In the dust on my cellar staircase…blinked again but there was nothing to see.”

Adam starts to notice things aren’t real.

“I keep my knees black and blue…ceiling anymore.”

Since adam found god, he’s not praying to something imaginary or just the ceiling anymore. His knees are black and blue from praying on the hardwood floor.

“Wake me if you’re out there!”

Adam is calling out for a guiding influence, whether it be an angel or god himself.

The Bird and the Worm

“With fronds like these well, who needs anemones.”

An obvious reference to one of Adam’s favorite movies, Finding Nemo.

“We’ll take a long walk through the cornfield and I’ll kiss you between the ears…”

Kind of a cute pun, ‘ears’ like ‘ears of corn’.

“You’re the bird, I’m the worm and it’s plain to see, that we were meant to be.”
I think that throughout the song Adam shows & sets up this perfect image of being in love, and being perfect with someone. In this phrase he shows that birds & worms are pretty much enemies, considering birds eat worms. That shows that the people who are in love in the song, Adam and this other girl, wouldn’t be the kind of people who would usually fall for the other.

Butterfly Wings

“We won’t need feathers to fly…”

This is an inspirational line telling us that you don’t need the proper ‘background’ to do well in life. For instance, adam never finished college and he still found the feathers he needed to fly to do well in life.

Captains and Cruiseships

“Old captains and brand new cruiseships…ocean with you.”

Two people in a relationship taking a break/exploring new options. The person “in LA” probably didn’t really want to take a break, but is doing it for the sake of his partner. He stays in la to wait for her to get back from “west palm beach”, hoping that she realizes that there isn’t anyone better for her out there than him. in the meanwhile, he feels lonely and lost without her. He eventually starts going crazy without the other person, so he’s considering instead of waiting for her to “come back to la”, that he should go to “West Palm Beach” and make a better effort and show her that they belong together. The reason the two cities are in quotations is because they aren’t to be taken literally, but to show that two people are ‘very far apart’ emotionally and LA and WPB are on the opposite sides of the country.

Cave In

“Please take a long hard look….history. i’ll strap my helmet on…dying to leave.”

Adam has an intense feeling of wanting to leave and with leaving, keep his worries behind him.

“Yeah I’lll ride the range and hide all my loose change…takes its toll on me.”

There’s a bit of a “pun” in there. When someone’s doing something that takes a “toll” on them, it normally means that they’re doing something that’s really tiring or stressing them out. So at first glance, those two lines basically mean, “Riding this dirt bike down a turnpike always tires me out. Toll, as a literal meaning, as quoted from the dictionary, is: “a payment or fee exacted by the state, the local authorities, etc., for some right or privilege, as for passage along a road or over a bridge.” And I guess he’s hiding the “loose change” (money) so the “dirt road” doesn’t take his money, or a “toll” from him.

“Tie my handlebars…take my leave and i won’t even look back.”

This could be looked at religiously, and you could say he is running away from a bad place, escaping from it, like temptation.

“Riding a dirtbike…takes its toll on me.”

Turnpikes are sharp, banked corners that are sometimes difficult to maneuver through at higher speeds. adam is conveying the difficulty of successfully navigating through a turnpike, or a rough time in life.

“I’ve had just about enough of quote ‘diamonds in the rough…”

adam is tired of hearing about how someone great could come out of a dark place, he wants to be that person.

“Because my backbone is paper thin…”

adam is a shy, cowardly person and doesn’t know if he’s capable of becoming a diamond out of the rough.

“If the bombs go off…silver lining.”

With every bad thing, something good (a silver lining) can come out of it.

“Though i’m always undermining too deep to know…”

Adam spent too much time dwelling on his mistakes so he didn’t realize there WAS a silver lining to each mushroom cloud.

The Christmas Song

This song could be looked at, figuratively of course, as the ‘stranger’ being Jesus and Adam finally spending Christmas with Him. So saying that Jesus was a ‘stranger’ means that Adam was not close to him once, but now since he’s physically alone, he decides to spend his days with Jesus.

Dear Vienna

“I regarded the world as such….viewed it in black and white.”

Adam is looks at the world as a dark and dismal place. When he views it in black and white, he changes and h e sees from another, worse off person’s point of view and realizes that his life could be much worse than it is.

“Then I reviewed every frame…caution tape.”

He changes his life dramatically. He does things he always wanted to do, tries new things and lives his life to the fullest. He also makes sure he will never become the way he was.

“Don’t refocus your eyes in the darkness…unravel the mystery.”

He is telling someone to never look back into that dark time in their life. Then he will be able to explain to them all of the wonderful things this world has to offer.

“Farewell all my friends in textbooks…blood cells cannot depend on the weather in photographs.”

His mood will no longer depend on the things he sees, no matter how bad they are because he’s decided to turn his life around.

“There’s a light show…shades of May when we got carried away.”

The light show is the stars, which Adam often seems to relate to hope. Adam tells you that there is hope. Then, it seems he’s talking to another person about all of the wonderful times they’ve had together after the dark times they had to go through.

Deer In the Headlights

In an intervew with Christianity Today, Adam said, ““I enjoy writing largely from the imagination, and usually that produces rather abstract imagery. But with ‘Deer in the Headlights,’ I wrote a personal song that plays close to the chest in a way that no other song I’ve written ever has. I was ending a serious relationship at the time, and I was harrowed by the fact that so many people (specifically me) have a funny tendency to desire romance merely for the sake of avoiding loneliness, which ultimately means it’s not about LOVE at all! Sometimes it’s easy to be ‘blinded by the light’ and forget all about what true romance is designed by God to be. When all you focus on are the warm fuzzies, a relationship can become dangerous and disastrous very quickly. So the song plays closely to the fact that I needed to pull myself out of the lights and remember what’s more important than the romantic butterflies.”

“Met a girl in the parking lot…pepper spray made it rather hard….I guess that’s the way it goes.”

The girl in this scenario comes off as standoffish even though he’s just trying to be a gentleman.

“Met a girl with a graceful charm…black eye and bloody nose..that’s the way it goes.”

The black eye and bloody nose symbolize the types of men this girl prefers, the ones that don’t care but make things a challenge instead. These are the types of guys most girls choose but ‘I guess that’s the way it goes.’

“Tell me again was it love at first sight…deer in the headlights.”

The chorus is basically saying that he’s head over heels for her, and this girl is always on his mind, and always in his focus; hence her being “the deer” in his “headlights”. Asking about love being bright is kind of saying: You do know that there is real, TRUE love out there, and GOOD, honest guys too. He’s met a girl and even if she treats him poorly she’s always in his mind.

“Sorry I even tried.”

Adam feels like he isn’t good enough no matter how hard he tries for this girl.

“If life was a game you would never play nice, if love was a beam you’d be blind in both eyes.”

The girl is the kind to play with his heart, and ‘not playing nice’ means not willing to cooperate. And she knows what love is, but she’s blind to his honesty.

Dementia

Adam said on a Twitter question and ask session that he was dealing with ‘a lot of regrets’ when he wrote this song with Mark Hoppus of Blink-182.

Dental Care

Adam mentioned at a Minnesota concert on May 1, 2010 that “Dental Care is about my experiences with braces in the third grade, and I hope my orthodontist is in the crowd because I wrote this song for him.”

Designer Skyline

“Options and possibilities are endless when we…”

Life is what you make it. This song is about something beautiful created out of nothing.

“You went from numbered lines to buildings overhead…”

Our ideas can transform into something even greater than what we thought they could be.

Dreams Don’t Turn to Dust

“Real life I’m sad to see you go….I’d rather be alone.”

Adam would rather be alone with his imagination than be stuck in reality.

“When diamonds boast that they can’t be crushed, let ‘em go cause dreams don’t turn to dust.”

You’ll ever be reaching for those parts of you that make you who you are. When put under pressure, diamonds, the hardest substance on Earth, can be turned into a diamond dust, but even with pressure and hard forces your dreams can’t be turned into dust, but they can be crushed if you let them be that way.

Early Birdie

“Good evening shuttle bus…”

The shuttle bus in this song is a new adventure waiting to be taken on.

“…new destinations where I leave my reflection on the glass. I’d ask but we don’t know how far these interstates go…”

The world is so large and vast it’s impossible to know what’s out there to be seen.

Fireflies

(taken from thecoloursfalllikesnow.tumblr.com)

Fireflies is about the overwhelming amount of opportunities in his life that he is constantly analyzing. When he uses the metaphor of ‘sleep’ he is actually referring to the time that he could be taking advantage of the opportunities when, in fact, he is sitting back and relaxing as they all kind of pass him by. He talks about being too tired to fall asleep which takes the meaning of his stress thinking about all the things he is missing out on.By putting some of the lightning bugs away, which are Fireflies, he is simply taking note of how to accomplish these things later on if need be. Some of these dreams he has to let go of because in the future they will no longer be attainable. In case his life takes a weird turn (‘gets real bizzare’), he will have this jar of opportunities, or “bugs”, to return to.The Moral of the song is take advantage of opportunities (fireflies) you have, but time goes fast, so you can’t acheive everything, but you can make the most of knowing what’s out there. So do what you can, but don’t lose sleep over it.

Fuzzy Blue Lights

“If I could look across the country…parks and lake resorts.”

though he obviously can’t see across all that distance, if he could, he has the desire to be able to count them.

“If I could open up my window…single file.”

Adam is very organized. He wants organization in his life.

“All those dreary rainclouds still bother me…camera eyepiece and cannot see.”

Adam can’t see clearly through his disorganization. He faces an obscurity to his happiness.

“If I was standing on a balcony…depressed and out of place..”

He is saddened to see someone else without him and realizes he needs order in his life.

“If I was flying on a plane above your town….you began to wave goodbye.”

Here he has realized that, though he has feelings for this person, he would ultimately be happier if they said their goodbyes. This does not come as an action he necessarily wants to take, however, is a necessity for re-establishing order and happiness.

Galaxies

This song merges directly from the song ‘January 28, 1986’ about the space shuttle disaster. Adam mentioned in an interview, “The song is a vivid portrayal to the idea that even amidst tragedy, victory can be achieved through Christ and through Him alone. The song is loosely based around the space shuttle Challenger disaster that occurred in 1986 and what I might’ve thought or felt if I were the flight commander on that ship, suddenly taken from reality into eternity in a split second.”

also:

“For me, in terms of writing and creating songs, I write from my heart and not for popularity and success. My prayer has always been that the Lord would take whatever results from my creative endeavors and that God would use me as His vessel. God can connect messages with whoever, however He chooses. In some ways it is none of my business. I’ve always dedicated each song and album and prayed that the Lord uses me and my songs however He chooses and take them places I can’t take them. 

This song in particular on the new album, in conjunction with “Angels,” are my prayers for God’s message to reach people. The lyrics “Dear God, I was terribly lost” are a parallel of my journey of my life before I came into a saving relationship with the Lord. For me, it’s like the whole galaxy was laid out before me and then I found God as my light. That’s where the idea of being on the space shuttle before it exploded and not having a Savior was frightening to me. That’s where my resolve came from and how this song is my bold statement of God being the only saving grace of the galaxy. In the song, I mention Hercules as an example of something vying for my attention and my faith. Hercules doesn’t have anything to offer me compared to Jesus Christ. That’s the whole message of the song.”

“Call back the cap-com, tick off the time bomb…”

Cap-com is short for Capsule Communicator, a tool used by NASA.

“Blow your backbone to bits!”

People ‘fear’ God and his powers. When you tell someone to ‘grow a backbone’ you are telling them to gain courage and stop fearing. This phrase, to me, means that you are SUPPOSED to fear God because He’s almighty and powerful.

“Hercules, you’ve got nothin’ to say to me cause you’re not the blinding light that I need…”

Hercules was half human, half God. In this case Hercules is representing man, and how man wasn’t there for him, only God was.

Hello Seattle

I think this song has a much deeper meaning to it, rather than about happiness it’s more about the ‘hospital aspect.’ It’s happy on the outside but to me it has a double meaning it seems. Again, just a thought.

“Hello Seattle, I am a sleeping pill…”

It’s possible Adam knew someone who was in the hospital.

“Hello Seattle, I am an old lighthouse….red in the morning, blue in the evening sun…”

These colors are the colors of ambulance lights.

“Hello Seattle…”

For each ‘hello Seattle,’ he could be describing what this person dreamed about outside of the hospital.

“Take me above your light…sing me to sleep tonight.”

It’s possible this person was dying.

Honey and the Bee

During the ‘Making of All Things Bright and Beautiful’ video, Adam says, “It’s about these two people who are at a dead place in both of their lives and just, I don’t know, they meet eachother and sparks happen. It’s just kind a cute song. It’s just kind of a sparkle.”

“Don’t remind me that some days I’m the windshield, and other days I’m just a lucky bug.”

Have you ever heard of the saying ‘some days you’re the windshield and some days you’re the bug’? It means that there are good days and there are bad days, the lucky windshield that faces all your problems with ease or the bug that gets crushed or swept away in the ‘tide’ or ‘sea of life.’

“As cold iron rails leave old mossy trails through the country side.”

This is the imagery on the front of the new album.

“The crow and the bean field are my best friends but boy, I need a hug (boy, I need a hug).”
From the perspective of a bee, going through life happy with the world it lives in but missing something (boy I need a hug).

“If the green left the grass on the other side I would make like a tree and leave.”
If you weren’t happy with your life or you were missing something, would you make an effort to find the “grass” on the other side?

“Don’t remind me I’m a chickadee in love with the sky….I’m scared they’ll forget me and flicker out.”

She feels a cute, innocent love like how the chickadee loves the sky. She’s afraid the spark won’t last or if he’ll even notice.

“I taste honey but I haven’t seen the hive. Yeah I didn’t look, I didn’t even try.”

She feels like she’s so close to him and can taste the sweetness of love, but they aren’t quite together yet.

“We are honey and the bee.”

Honey and bees go together just like they do! :3

“Backyard of butterflies surrounded me; I fell in love with you, like bees to honey.”
Falling in love with him feels as magical as being in a yard filled with butterflies. She falls in love with him like the bees love honey.

“So let’s up and leave the weeping to the willow tree and pour our tears in the sea.”

She’s suggesting to leave their sadness behind and just be happy together.

“I swear there’s a lot of vegetables out there, yet I never thought…till you suddenly bloomed and I knew that I’d always love you.”

‘Vegetables’ refer to a lot of people out there and he didn’t think he’d find anyone until she ‘bloomed’ and came up from the ground where he could see her.

Hospital Flowers

“Happiness returned to me through a grave emergency.”

This is about someone who experiences a terrible car crash that makes them appreciate life more.

“A high-speed collision gave a new sense of sight to me.”

Thanks to the car wreck, he gains a new perspective on life due to his close encounter with death.

“I was never afraid of the darkness again, My burns were third degree, but I’d been set free, Cause grace had finally found its way to me.”

After the experience he has learned more about himself and won’t be scared of anything again as he has come so near to death that little worries don’t matter anymore and by going through the adversity of hospital he has new strength for any other challenges. He was set free from life and people as he knows the true perspective on life and what reality really means.

Hot Air Balloon

SOON

How I Became the Sea

“I could finally crash again, and that’s how I became the sea.”

To put it simply, this song is about an event that made him break down, but Adam learned to build himself up, and he became calm and fought against that what strained him. He became ‘free’ of a problem and was able to build himself up through it.

I’ll Meet You There

“If we could be immobile for some time and finally figure out the way we feel…cloudy question marks that still look a bit surreal.”

This song seems like it’s about a long distance relationship, or just a relationship, with a girl. They are in two different places and he wants them to stop their lives for a second to figure it out. He sees the full potential between the two of them.

“Oh I tend to disappear here and there…you’ll feel me everywhere.”

He’s talking about whenever he has to leave her, the memories of things they did together should remind her of him and how he is not completely gone, and how the distance cannot overcome the love he has for her.

If My Heart Was a House (my favorite, obviously!)

“You’re the sky that I fell through, and I remember the view whenever I’m holding you. “
I think he’s talking about when he was falling for her, he fell so fast as if he were falling through a sky. And there were things (like clouds) that could have appeared to have been there to stop him, but they couldn’t because it would be impossible. And even though he fell so fast, sometimes he forgets how much he really loves her, but remembers when she’s in his arms.

“Chills run down my spine as our fingers entwine, and your sighs harmonize with mine. Unmistakably, I can still feel your heart beat fast when you dance with me.”
Even though they’re in love, and it seems like a serious relationship, he still has that little kid crush on her that started everything out, and it keeps their love alive. They have the same thoughts, and he enjoys being similar to her.

“We got older and I should’ve known (do you feel alive?) that I’d feel colder when I walk alone (oh but you’ll survive).”
They’re growing apart as they’re getting older/ growing old of each other. and they’re losing the spark that made them feel so alive in their relationship. He’s saying he should have known from the beginning that this would happen, they couldn’t be perfect together forever. He thinks that even through this he will try to continue to make their relationship work because the love he feels for her can overcome whatever died out.

“So I may as well ditch my dismay. Bombs away, bombs away.”
Since he knows that they’ll survive the issues in their relationship, he’s telling himself he should just forget about the problems and pretend they never happened, and try to go back to normal. “Bombs away,” meaning something like ‘alright, I can survive this, lets try it all over again.’

“Circle me and the needle moves gracefully back and forth, if my heart was a compass, you’d be North.”
The ‘needle’ refers to the needle of a compass. The compass refers to his heart. North is the direction that is usually referred to as ‘home’ in the movies as well as in this case. No matter what, his heart (or the compass) will lead him straight home and back to her.

“Risk it all ‘cause I’ll catch you if you fall.”

He knows that they both have each other to lean on.

“Wherever you go, if my heart was a house, you’d be home.”
He’s saying that a house can just be a house, a house can’t just be a home- it has to become one. In this case, she’s his home. His shelter, his everything- and it doesn’t matter where they are. Separate or together, no matter how far away.

“It makes me smile because you said it best, I would clearly feel blessed if the sun rose up from the West.”

The sun does not rise from the West, it sets in it. He wants something he can’t have, which is her, and she told him that everyone wants things they can’t have – like the sun rising up from the West.

“Flower bomb perfume, all my clothes smell like you cause your favorite shade is navy blue.”

He owns a lot of navy blue clothes because that’s her favorite color on him, and her perfume has rubbed off on them.

January 29, 1986

Adam mentioned about this song, “There’s a track on the new record called January 28, 1986 and it features a clip from Reagan when the space shuttle Challenger blew up that same year and it’s kind of a sobering… piece, and it stuck me. I was actually born that same year, ‘86, my parents always used to talk about it and so it was always on my mind growing up and I felt like it would be a good thing, to pay dues to that, and I’ve just out of respect featured a little interlude on the record, that Reagan quote, and the idea behind it is that it’s kind of a precursor to the following track on the record called Galaxies, just to kind of set up the premise of the following song and it’s just a short little interlude and it was a fun thing to do. I’m glad it came together.”

Kamikaze

“The princess in her flower bed pulled the jungle underground.”

The princess refers to Eve, as in, Adam and Eve. Pulling the jungle underground refers to the disruption of the peace and harmony in the garden leading it to be sealed off. (Genesis 3:24)

“Where cherry bombs stained the blackbirds red, and explosions never make a sound…”

Red represents blood. This reflects the passage from Romans that says “the wages for sin is death”, or it could be the atonement of Christ’s death and resurrection (painting all humankind red with his blood). ‘Explosions’ could refer to two big ‘exploding’ historical events in the Christian tradition – the resurrection and crucifixion.

“Oh comet come down! Kamikaze over me…”

Kamikaze could refer to the Holy Spirit guiding him through every day life as he “comes alive.”

“He’ll find me fighting back a terrible force…’cause I’m not afraid to die alone.”

Through the Holy Spirit’s help we can be bold and courageous, not be ‘afraid to die alone’. Adam’s talking about how he wants to stand up for who he believes in and finish the race well.

“Bring in the ember glow…”

“For my days vanish like smoke; my bones burn like glowing embers.” (Psalm 102:3) could be a reference to that biblical line.And a couple verses further down, verses 6 and 7, there’s this: “I am like a desert owl, like an owl among the ruins. I lie awake; I have become like a bird alone on a roof.”Now THAT sounds like it could be one of Adam’s favorite verses.

Lonely Lullaby

http://owlcityblog.com/2011/03/14/i-hate-goodbyes

I’m pretty sure this explains it better than I could.

Meteor Shower

“I can finally see that you’re right there beside me.”

Adam realizes that he’s found God and that He’s been beside Adam all along and hasn’t left, even if Adam turned away once in his life.

“I am not my own for I have been anew. Please don’t let me go, I desperately need you.”

Adam is talking about being made new in Christ, or maybe just realizing that he’s not his own because God created him, and he desperately needs God.

On the Wing

I think this song is about an experience he had with a girl. Not just someone he loves or thinks about, but about a certain experience, maybe over one summer he went on a trip with someone and this song describes that experience.

“…the weekend we were in love.”

This suggests that it is about one weekend while he was spending some time with a certain girl. They had a lot of fun, experienced many things, this song is about that memory. We all have memories with certain people that have a very deep impact on us. Hudson Bay is a geographic location, probably has something to do with where this experience occurred.

“Photos on the walls of New York shopping malls distract me so I stay inside…”

He surrounds himself with the idea of people so he doesn’t feel as alone anymore.

“Late nights and early parades, still photos and noisy arcades.”
These 2 lines paints a picture like they were experiencing something in a place, maybe a seasonal or cultural celebration. They took photos, walked around crowds and arcades, like they were a couple. But they may not really have been a couple for whatever reason, and this could only last for a weekend, but he wished they were because he refers to it as “the weekend they were in love”.

“Are you there, or are you just a decoy dream in my head? Am I home or am I simply tumbling all alone?”
These lines make me think that he is dreaming of a girl that no longer feels the way he does or maybe never did. She’s a decoy. He’s alone because he loves her and he cannot love another until he knows for certain that there isn’t anything between them. He’s asking himself, “Should I wait for you? Are you there?”

Panda Bear

“Content like a panda bear, still breathing the fresh mountain air…”

This is a happy-go-lucky song, about enjoying life and being carefree just like a lazy little panda.Peppermint Winter

This song explains itself. Honestly, I don’t believe there are any hidden meanings behind it, it’s just a fun little winter song that tells a story. For the record, when Adam mentions “my mean older brother stuffs snow down my coat,” that’s fictional – Adam is an only child.

Plant Life

Adam comments, “There’s this lack of life in Minnesota and I wanted to sort of play off that. It got my mind thinking: What would life be like for a person trapped in a haunted house, where all these daisies are popping up through the floorboards, and there’s ghosts and bears and stuff. It’s about a likable guy living in a melancholy world.”

owlcityblog.com/2011/05/09/plant-life/

There’s a blog that explains it. Adam views the world as a haunted house, but that doesn’t stop him from seeing the beauty outside of it. It could also be about old painful memories that he wishes would just fade or be overtaken. Its about how people often live in the past and how he desires to live in the beauty of each moment instead of dwelling in the grimy parts of the past.

Rainbow Veins

“Dear Pacific Bay, won’t you take me away?”

Adam wants someone to show him how to live. He’s bored with his life. He want someone, probably a girl, to show him to let go and not worry too much and to just leave it all behind.

“The silver sound is all around and the colors fall like snow. The feeling of letting go, I guess we’ll never know.”

In this song “color” represents, living life, or the spark.Maybe Adam and his girl felt like the spark wasn’t there and they’re about to give up on letting go. She feels like maybe it’s time for them to take a break, but he’s more optimistic and wants to try it again and keep going. he’s determined and feels like they can be together. He feels like they can brighten each other lives.

“Cheer up and dry your damp eyes and tell me when it rains. And I’ll blend up that rainbow above you and shoot it through your veins.”

The rainbow is like the colors, or the happiness .He feels he can put the happiness and drive that she once had back in her life.

“Cause your heart has a lack of color and we should’ve known. That we’d grow up sooner or later cause we wasted all our free time alone.”

They wasted all that time apart and now they can be together, so he’s telling her he can put the color back in his life if she’d let him try again.

The Real World

http://owlcityblog.com/2011/05/13/the-real-world/

“If we dissolve without a trace, will the real world even care?”

I think he means that people are so blind that people ‘disappear’ every day, whether it be to their own worlds or literally disappear. He’s sort of commenting on his introverted-ness, like some people in the world wouldn’t care if a person just disappeared forever because we’re so caught up in everything.

“From the greenbelt balcony, the wildfires look so pretty. Ponderosa canopy…to the ruby redwood tree…”

These are all references to California. It reminds me of ‘West Coast Friendship.’

Rugs From Me to You

Basically, this song is appreciating what you have and Adam puts it in a very ‘punny’ way.

“To pay, or toupee, that is the question…”

A toupee is a hairpiece, and another word for that is a “rug”, which explains the title, and the name of his store.

The Saltwater Room

“I opened my eyes last night and saw you in the lowlight.”

A lowlight: a particularly bad or unpleasant event, detail, or part. He saw her in an unpleasant way he did not want to see her in. He discovered a part of her personality that he missed before… this time he saw her in a negative or sad light for the first time.

“Walking down by the bay, on the shore, staring up at the planes that aren’t there anymore.”
In this case, the planes represent bygone memories that the couple are reminiscing together, late into the night.

“I was feeling the night grow old and you were looking so cold. Like an introvert, I drew my over shirt
Around my arms and began to shiver violently before.”
The lyrics here suggest that both people want more warmth/heat between their interactions, despite their history. He shivers thinking of the memories they’ve shared.

“You happened to look and see the tunnels all around me, running into the dark underground. All of the subways around create a great sound. To my motion fatigue: farewell.”
The singer always links himself to modes of transportation so the tunnels around him are probably the relationship choices the girl can make that involves him. However, all solutions to work towards a relationship seems grim (“running into the dark underground”). The guy is getting tired of the limbo situation he has with the girl… dating, not dating, dating not dating, fighting, making up, etc (“to my motion fatigue: goodbye”). He either wants to take initiative and make this relationship finally work or give up.

“With your ear to a seashell you can hear the waves in underwater caves as if you actually were inside a saltwater room.”
With their imagination, the the relationship would be idealistic. However, Adam reinforces that this idealized picture of relationship is different from reality (“As if…”). When you press your ears against a seashell, you can pretend you’re by the ocean and underwater paradise. Perhaps here the singer is talking about a long distance relationship; when you talk to a person online or on the phone, you can pretend you are also somewhere else… with significant other.

“What will it take to make or break this hint of love?”

The little hint of it is enough to make them want to fall in love, but they aren’t yet. That’s why they want to spend time with each other, to see if they will fall in love. It’s a new relationship starting out.

“Time together is just never quite enough. When you and I are alone, I’ve never felt so at home.”
When you’re in a relationship, it doesn’t matter how much time you spend together, it’s never enough. Almost makes me think of ‘If My Heart Was a House.’

“Can you believe that the crew has gone and wouldn’t let me sign on? All my islands have sunk in the deep, so I can hardly relax or even oversleep.”

Adam feels lost. He feels like he’s losing his mind/sleep over this relationship (or lack thereof).

“I guess I’ll never know why sparrows love the snow, well turn off all of the lights and set this ballroom aglow.”
The guy thinks that they’ll never know what will happen if the relationship is given another chance (with no distance, etc), but he decides to enjoy the present, in the presence of the girl.

Shooting Star

In a recent interview, Adam was asked about this optimistic song and the song was given a background. “The buoyantly optimistic song was recorded in New York and co-produced by the Stargate team, with the synthesizer piano intro coming from something Young had originally created for his sophomore album, 2009’s platinum “Ocean Eyes.” “I could never make it work at the time,” Young remembers, “but Stargate heard that little synth line and built a great track around it. It just kind of happened out of mid air.” Lyrically, Young adds, “I wanted to sort of capture the idea that everybody can start a movement if we all unite and capture this sort of standing on the edge, ready to leap off kind of feeling, knowing that even though everyone has dark days, if we really work together we can make anything happen.”

Shy Violet

“She made my stormy skies beautiful.”

This song is short and simple, like ‘Meteor Shower,’ and the meaning is clear that this girl makes his stormy skies, or bad days, beautiful.

Sky Diver

”..and I was falling through the sky.”

This song is simple too. Adam couldn’t describe the feeling of falling through the sky with too many words so he uses a tune and instrumental to make us feel the rush of air and the imagery above Hawaii.

Strawberry Avalanche

Adam told an interviewer on spin.com, “I spent last summer mountain climbing with a host family in Tibet and actually witnessed a live avalanche from across an immense ravine. Needless to say, it was both terrifying and awe inspiring. After returning home that night, I slouched on the couch and ate a bowl of Cheerios with fresh strawberries. I thought getting hit in the face by a huge strawberry avalanche would be the most romantic way to ‘buy the farm.’ And I’m the farthest thing from a farmer.”

Sunburn

“She took my hand in hers and whispered her love for me, the lantern died that night but we didn’t need to see. Implying that she’s the bees knees and I am the cat’s meow, it’s funny how she recalls what I can’t remember now.”
She tells him how she feels, and he is trying to remember how he felt when he loved her.

“We both put our sunblock on, played on the beach and vowed that we’d live and we’d learn…”

The beach is like the ‘playing field,’ where they’re free and single and can go about with other relationships. They keep coming back to each other and with each breakup they keep telling themselves they’ll live and learn.

“…but she got a tan and I got a sunburn.”

Adam is saying that she was a faster learner, and knew how to get a tan instead of a sunburn. I think throughout the whole song it’s saying that she took time to realize things and understand them, which in turn made life easier for her. As in, getting a tan instead of a sunburn is better/easier. It also might imply that she was older than him, and therefore learned things before him. the girl brushed him off like nothing happened at all. She moved on and he didn’t. Adam is saying he got “sunburned” in the relationship, basically he’s having issues moving on and she’s almost just burned into his heart.

“But when her smile came back, and I didn’t feel half as horrible…”

I think this is like a cyclical relationship. She keeps coming back around and he keeps falling harder and harder for him, despite getting ‘burned.’ 

Super Honeymoon

“The solar flares burned my arms and made her makeup run on our super lunar honeymoon.”

This song is about a girl he messed things up with and he misses her. The solar flares he referring to are the problems in their relationship, and he made her cry because the lyrics say and made her makeup run. He still remembers everything about her, so he used metaphors throughout the song to portray everything she liked and everything about this special girl.

Swimming In Miami
SOON

The Technicolor Phase

“If you cut me I suppose I would bleed, the colors of the evening stars.”

I’m not heavily religious, but when I listen to a song like this, I can’t help but believe this song is about God being ‘everywhere.’ This line could mean God being up with the stars in the sky.

“I am the black in the book, the letters on the pages that you memorize.”

To put it simply, the Bible. In theology, God is ‘present on each of the pages.’

This Is the Future

“Wake up on your own and look around you cause you’re not alone.”

Someone is going through rough times and they think they’re going through them alone when in reality they have people around them. Adam is sayingyou need to wake up and get back to reality and realize that you’re never alone, because God is always there and will never leave your side.

“Release your high hopes and they’ll survive.”
Learn to let go of things. It can also be interpreted as a prayer. An almost “ask and you shall receive”-type thing. Again I’m not religious, but I’m trying to think from Adam’s point of view, and since Adam is religious, he could be saying something like, pray to God, and ask God for things, and the outcome will always be good, whether it’s how you planned it or not.

“Cause this is the future and you are alive.”
Today is today, and no matter what happens, you’re alive, and you should enjoy that.

“You’re headed home.”
You are on the path to Heaven, which is also called a ‘home’ for Christians and those who are religious.

Tidal Wave

“All my life I wish I broke mirrors instead of promises ‘cause all I see is a shattered conscience staring right back at me.”
He regrets that his dishonesty, his broken promises are the reason his life is ruined. He feels that he has done so badly that he is beyond redemption; his conscience is ‘shattered’.

“Then I was given grace and love, I was blind but now I can see, ‘cause I found a new hope from above and courage swept over me.”

Obviously religious references. He’s singing about the notion of a God and a heaven making him feel more secure in light of death. He had been afraid of death and the idea of nothing but a void that comes after it. But now he feels that there is a transcendence that gives life meaning.

“The end is uncertain and I’ve never been so afraid but I don’t need a telescope to see that there’s hope and that makes me feel brave.”

Though he does not now how life is going to unfold and he my struggle or have doubts, he knows that God is watching over him, which makes him feel protected and secure in God.

The Tip of the Iceberg

Adam said about this song, “It’s a song about growing up and wishing you were somewhere else, and maybe suddenly realizing that you’ve wasted a good piece of your life. It’s about learning not to take things for granted and really being deliberate and intentional about living life as if the day was your last, and so it’s really about appreciating all that’s around you.”

“If all the roads were paved with ice that wouldn’t thaw or crack…on to Alaska and back, cause you keep me warm.”

He can do anything with this girl he likes at his back. She supports him and he feels invincible. The ‘you’ could also be God.

“I’d rather skate on the thinnest ice.”

He’d rather take risks and chances because that’s what life is all about.

“I’d travel the sub-zero tundra…I’ll do whatever it takes to change.”

He wants his life to take off, he wants to change for himself and for this girl. Or he could be changing himself for God.

“Rivulets flow from your eyes.”

A rivulet is a small stream. This could be the bumps in the relationship that he wants to fix, or tears she’s crying.

To the Sky

This song was used in the animated movie “Legend of the Guardians”. It’s a story about a young owl growing up & following his dreams. I think the meaning of this song is something like that. About the confusion of growing up when you are suddenly thrown into society (shipwrecked in a sea of faces), leaving home(bid the forest floor goodbye), following your dreams (chase your dreams,and remember me, sweet bravery,) and “spreading your wings” (brace the wind and take to the sky) and taking flight and becoming someone new.

Umbrella Beach

Adam was asked about Umbrella Beach and responded, “Home for me has always been this very small town a kind of homebody place for me, a place of refuge for me you know so as an introverted guy, um you know I feel like me as an introvert saying “I get to stay home tonight!” as a good thing versus an extrovert saying “oh I have to stay home tonight.” It’s like home for me has always been this safe haven so it’s this kind of secret you know hidden place had always been exciting for me.”

“Home will always be here, unseen, out of sight….disappear and hide.”

Almost a reference to Adam’s introversion. He’s embarking on some kind of trip that will take him to far places, and yet he can always rely on this place to be somewhere safe and secluded he can count on. Reminds me of what my parents tell me while I’m away at college, how “home will always be there for you.” And it will.

“And I think dreamy things as I’m waving goodbye, so I’ll spread out my wings and fly.”

Seems to say that the singer is a child that understands that he has to leave one day (like in the music video). However, he will always have fond memories of the place, and when he spreads his wings he will “fly” and make a new path for himself. Then again, he won’t forget who he is no matter how far away from home he travels.

Vanilla Twilight:

SOON.

West Coast Friendship

*This song could possibly be about Adam’s relationship with Ann Marie Munson, who goes to school on the West Coast, specifically Azusa Pacific University.

“Are you out there where the rainy days begin…”

Rain starts from the West. Could also refer to the fact that people on the west coast who rarely get rain actually enjoy it when it comes, whereas he gets it all the time.

“..cut out a door in my new living room floor.”

He’s desperate to get away - possibly even though he’s just arrived somewhere seeing as it’s his “new living room floor.”

“I bought a one-way ticket, cause I knew I’d never see the ground unless I was aboard a jet plane and we were going down.”
He only wanted to go through this once, because he would never see the truth- the ground- unless disaster was inevitable.

The Yacht Club

Adam said about this song, “I wanted a big dancey song with those big synths. It plays on the idea of an outsider looking in. I tend not to be the most eloquent guy when I’m around pretty girls, and it’s sort of a comment on that.”

“She would rather fall in chocolate than fall in love especially with me.”

She’s not much into the idea of falling in love, but he’s head over heels for her.

“I would rather go swimming with great white sharks than wade in romance…courage to ask her to dinner or even to dance.”

Adam has never had much luck with dates, girlfriends, or love in general but she’s making him change his mind.

“I wish that we could sail our sad days away…barracuda chased our dog days away forever, let’s sink or swim until we fall in love.”

He wants to take a risk and fall in love whether she likes it or not.The chorus states that he wants to be happy, dance in the moonlight, join ‘the yacht club’, and sail away all their sad days- kind of like a fantasy.