The City Calls - A Spark To Ignite (TRACK BY TRACK)

The City Calls new EP A Spark To Ignite just came out and the vocalist Lucas did a track by track for us discussing the meaning of the songs. Click READ MORE to check it out!

Get Away
This song is for anyone has ever been back-stabbed, found out the mean streak of someone you thought you knew or have had someone try and sabotage something you have that's good, because they're threatened or jealous.
I wanted the lyrics to have a real bite-back attitude to them and I wanted to be singing it and thinking of those times and thinking 'Let's hit this chorus so I can
let off some steam.' I think we let loose a little bit of those emotions you get from those unwanted situations. "You'll never bring us down.", is the tag line throughout the song and it's not just about the band it's about us and everyone singing along and listening.

Kings
When the music was being written for this song I was going through some issues with my voice, extreme strain and fatigue, so I was feeling pretty frustrated. Having to rest it was boring but I had the time to start writing more and I had some lines that I wanted to use as chorus parts. "Do we carry on to feel alive? Our hopes and dreams were set aside." was what I wanted to use for the chorus of this song because it was an exaggeration of how I was feeling. The longer I rested the more downtime we had gigging, obviously. So, the song's roots lay within that but once it was written and I finished my vocal parts it became a song about perseverance and it had this driven attitude. Keep doing what you're doing, no matter what, until you feel like a King or Queen.

Truth or Dare
This song is about the middle of a break-up with someone who lies... a lot. I was thinking about how some situations in a struggling relationship can be quite petty and childish and the idea of using a song title named after game you popularly play when you're younger worked for me. The 'Truth' being relevant to the lyrics of lying and expressing how you feel and the 'Dare' relates to someone wanting to make it work with someone, regardless of the other halves lying little tongue.

Kryptonite
Partying, hangovers, and late night sing alongs. This song really focuses on those very good times. It was written around the time we all first met and started getting to know each other and we just wrote a song that was really positive in attitude and what people could all sing-along to without really needing to learn all the words. Older friends and fans know the real meaning but now with it finally getting a deserved released to a wider audience, I'd like anyone hearing it for the first time to make what they will of it. I hope they're partying when they hear it too.

Lucky Start
We first demoed this song in my room with a make-shift 'studio' of a macbook, cheap cables and a practice guitar amp. We normally just go into a rehearsal room with some guitar lines and take it from there but this was different, we were all cramped in my room writing and recording as we went. So, naturally, this song felt like it needed a vocal part we could all do at once. That is where the 'HEY' and 'Woahs' came from in the choruses. A real sense of vocal community. I'd always liked the idea of having a catchy 'Woah' melody with a lyrical melody over the top and I wrote the chorus before I started the verse lines. Eventually the song turned out to be based on someone who has previously tried to get someone to 'like' them and they haven't been interested and as time goes on they get hurt and without being properly together they have a terrible history.

Meet In The Middle
The music to this song was so powerful and when the other guys were rehearsing without vocals I really didn't want to spoil it. So I dug deep into some personal areas of my life and turned those into verses that people can hopefully relate to. It's about having someone and then loosing them because you didn't invest your emotions as well as you should or could have. I liked the idea of having the chorus start with a really simple statement because the music is so large and uplifting it had to be to the point and to just have a moment to go "Oh, I guess I should have put my heart into that a little more.", I used to do that a lot and writing this song helped me understand that. We all knew that this song will be the last track on the record from the start of writing the music, so it was important to try and make this issue in the lyrics feel resolved. They didn't turn out that way though and I personally think that's for the better because I love a cliff-hanger.
"One day I'll meet in the middle with you.", just don't give up on someone if you feel you need them, because eventually you'll both meet halfway; un-rushed, no problems, feelings mutual and both be ready for something awesome.