Listen to Owl City 'Speed Of Love' from New Album 'The Midsummer Station' [Exclusive Premiere]

 

After writing, producing and recording his first two albums all by himself, Owl City (aka Adam Young) decided to change up his creative process and invited others to collaborate with him on his new album project. "The first and the second record I did all on my own. It's easy to overthink what you're doing and being too invested in it in a bad way, and it's easy to care too much when you're the only guy," he explains in a new EPK about his new LP, "The Midsummer Station." "It's a new process to work with other writers. It's scary to have another person co-pilot this project that I've held so close to the chest."

The result of leaving his artistic comfort zone turned out to be very refreshing and inspiring for the singer. "It's kind of exhilarating to not have a hundred percent control over what happens," Young explains. "The focus is all about creating the best song you can make. It takes pride and ego out of the equation."

Young enlisted people like Matt Thiessen (Relient K), Stargate (Rihanna, Wiz Khalifa), GRAMMY-winning engineer Robert Orton (Lady Gaga, Darren Hayes) and the team of Josh Crosby, Nate Campany and Emily Wright (the latter known for her work with Dr. Luke) to work with him on the album. Owl City challenged himself to work with this dynamite team to create a cohesive collection of pop songs for "The Midsummer Station." "Right now I'm really fascinated by capturing magic in a really catchy pop song," he explains. "If you have three minutes and it has to be catchy and ear-candy, that's like a cool challenge."

He may consider it a challenge, but Young has absolutely nothing to worry about. Over the years, he has proven that he knows exactly how to serve up undeniably catchy pop. In fact, in a world that is saturated with cookie-cutter pop tunes, Young has developed an enchanting pop sound that is very uniquely his.

The track "Speed Of Love," that premieres exclusively on this blog today for one day only, is a great example of that. Delicate and cheerful, the song is quintessential Owl City. It features his crisp, finely tuned vocals and explosive synth riffs that stir up a potent brew of emotive pop that without a doubt will pump out of your speakers faster than the speed of light to delight your ear drums the moment it hits. (Owl City "The Midsummer Station" is out August 21 via Republic Records. Pre-order the album on iTunes now http://smarturl.it/OwlCityPre.)

[Stream no longer available.]