"You Might Not Believe Your Eyes" - Owl City's "Fireflies" re-imagined as a pop punk/metal crossover
Fraser Macintosh
Dec 6, 2019
3 min read
Quite a recognisable and iconic shot no?
So, I decided that I wanted to re-imagine/destroy the song “Fireflies” by American one-man electronica project Owl City. My goal was to translate the melody and energy of the song into a heavy metal arrangement similar in style to French punk metal band Chunk! No, Captain Chunk!, with a few of my own compositional and production ideas incorporated as well.
Initially, most of my time was taken up by re-arranging different parts of the original track and adapting them to fit with what I had in mind for my version. With this in mind I’d like to highlight two sections in particular. Firstly, the very start of the original features a lively, cheerful synth pattern and I thought it would be kinda neat to emulate this by rewriting it for tapped electric guitar. However, ignorant was I to the amount of grief that this would go on to cause. It was an absolute nuisance to try and play and I ended up having to record it in short, two bar segments and stitch it together from there (ah the joys of having a cool idea but not the skill to pull it off). I used a smooth fuzz tone coupled with a fluttering echo effect and a twangy tweed amp sim, as well as an EQ setting geared towards adding presence in the mids and high end and removing unwanted low end mud. This would go on to be my lead guitar tone for the majority of the track.
Secondly, I used the string part that kicks in on the original at 1:53 in a couple of ways. I initially used it to form a guitar overlay that comes in a quarter of the way through the second verse as this provided a subtle hint towards the second, heavier half of the second verse. Here, the string part is used to create a disgustingly brutal breakdown-style riff and overall feel.
One production technique that I made extensive use of on multiple tracks was the act of taking two separate takes of the same part and panning them to create width. I had never tried this before as I thought that it would just make the mix sound messy but as long as you’ve got two solid takes, panning them actually makes the part sound much bigger and more exciting.[1]
I also made the grievous error of deciding to redo the vocals myself. I am not a vocalist by trade and as such am unable to even come close to recreating Adam Young’s vocal talents but I think that this went as well as it realistically could have given my limitations. I was able to pick up a few tips from the Waves article on mixing lead vocals, such as applying a low pass filter to cut out frequencies below 80-100Hz[2], focussing on adding mids to allow the vocals to compete within a dense rock mix and blending your vocal track with an aggressively compressed version of itself to add energy and presence[3].
Other small points of interest in my version include the difference in arrangement between the verses and choruses; the verses are heavy, rhythmic and grooving with double-kick laden drum parts and the choruses switch to a more upbeat, halftime feel more in keeping with a pop punk aesthetic. This juxtaposition of arrangement, feel and timbre is something that Chunk! No, Captain Chunk! are notorious for and it sounds absolutely badass in my opinion. I also referred to producer Cody Stewart’s “Top 5 Metal Production Tips” that he wrote for Audient. Particularly, the part where he talks about finding a good relationship between the bass guitar and kick drum by cutting out low end frequencies on one track where the other lives and vice versa. For bass, I cut at around 61Hz and for drums at around 90Hz.
Anywho, here are links to both the original version, as well as my complete decimation of the song "Fireflies". Pls don't hate me.
Cheers for reading and listening and have a rifftastic day,
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