Search - Owl City :: Ocean Eyes [Deluxe Edition]

Adam Young has ripped off Ben Gibbard

Stephenhero | 09/14/2010

(1 out of 5 stars)

"Without a shadow of a doubt, Adam Young has ripped off Ben Gibbard 100%. Not only has he copied Ben Gibbard's vocal style exactly but his lyrical content is crazy similar. The auto-tune is the only difference. My God it is obnoxious! When I first heard Owl City at work I though it was Death Cab for Cutie and that they had sold out. I was even going to write Death Cab hate mail. I was so mad. But then after I calmed down, I reasoned "it can't be Ben Gibbard - he would never use auto-tune." My mistake in thinking it was the new Death Cab album - Owl City is only 50% Postal Service/50% Death Cab in sound! - My actual thought process was this - "I can understand Ben Gibbard combining the Postal Service sound with Death Cab since Postal Service was way more successful but I could not figure out the auto-tune. wtf? did they really need the money that bad? But then I googled some of the lyrics and found this Owl City? So here is the deal kids - Adam Young has ripped off both of Ben Gibbard's Projects! There are absolutely no other influences. Adam Young has just added the tacky auto-tune to the vocals. He has brought nothing else to the table musically. It's embarrassing for him. This guy is lacking in aesthetic sensibilities and a sense of what is cool. Auto-tune was horrible when Cher used it and then country music picked it up. There is nothing alternative or cool about it. It's just stupid and low brow. I really think Ben Gibbard should sue Adam Young. In an age when it is so hard to prove plagiarism - I think this is actually a very clear cut case. I bet Universal Republic (Young's label) will say they have never heard of Death Cab or Postal Service. All the kids who don't know anything about music are eating this Owl City crap up. I can only imagine that we will have a whole generation of kids who when they finally hear Ben Gibbard will be saying Death Cab ripped off Owl City. Unfortunately for us, Adam Young is using the Mac icon to sell his crappy music. This can only get worse. Its all so very sad."