SOURCE – Gone With The Flow is the latest Elwood Stray album, coming out six years after Burn The Bridge. How do you feel the songwriting and recording sessions went for this set of material – and did the prolonged down time due to the global pandemic allow you and the band to really dig deeper into the finer details of this record?
Maik Nehrkorn (Vocals) – Gone With The Flow has really been a flow also during our writing sessions. After all the years, putting out singles independently, we more or less knew in which direction we would need to go with our first album. In general we have always been very focused on small details within our music, which most probably never will be recognized but ourselves. Still it is the last 1% that makes us more satisfied with the material than ever. The pandemic situation itself did not really play into this.
SOURCE – What are you most proud of with Gone With The Flow?
Maik Nehrkorn (Vocals) – Gone With The Flow feels like the perfect summary of what we, always wanted to do with Elwood Stray. Like we said earlier regarding releasing a lot of singles independently figuring out where our musical influences lead us to, we feel like GWTF combines them into the perfect mixture that we would describe as being us, Elwood Stray.
SOURCE – What is the biggest challenge at this point when it comes to your songwriting – coming up with strong melodies and lyrics, or more of the music so you don’t repeat yourselves?
Maik Nehrkorn (Vocals) – Honestly speaking, the whole creation of music is always a challenge, at least for us. We are trying to push our standards and boundaries with every song and additionally after releasing a full length album you also try to evolve your sound to the next level. Sometimes the hardest thing is not getting lost in all the possibilities and experiments and to put your eyes on the overall goal again.
SOURCE – Considering the band combines elements of metal and hardcore angles in your style, are there certain trademark elements that have to be there to make the final grade for a Elwood Stray song this deep in the band’s career?
Maik Nehrkorn (Vocals) – For us there is no real checklist that a song needs to go through before we mark it as release ready. For us the most important thing in music is that we feel something when listening to the record. The combination of music and lyrics needs to create a vibe which wants us to dig further into the direction a record is pushing us to. This is the only thing we aim for when writing songs for Elwood Stray.
SOURCE – I wanted to talk specifically about the video for Season. Could you go into how the concept for the video came to be in relation to the song?
Maik Nehrkorn (Vocals) – The Seasons video was a very special shoot for us! It was by far the fastest we have ever done, due to the great job of Chris Hesse of strangeworks visuals and it was shot in one of the clubs that we have had our first concert in. Since this was the single that dropped together with our first album we thought this is a neat combination to finish our video cycle this way. Regarding the concept: Seasons is one of our songs that felt very clean and honest to us. Therefore we wanted to have this feeling also being transported via the video as much as possible. Especially with the mood curve which lyrically exists in seasons we wanted to highlight the final shift also with video effects which has been realized by the idea to mask our bodies with the galaxy backgrounds.
SOURCE – When you think about the concept of success, what does that word mean to you as far as being a musician – and has that definition changed from your initial years getting into the business versus today?
Maik Nehrkorn (Vocals) – The band always has put the thought of realizing ourselves in the music first. Of course when having the idea of starting Elwood Stray it was a pure project to have fun and it still is for us! In the end seeing the progress in our ability to express ourselves with music and especially seeing these songs relate to everybody listening is just insane.
SOURCE – How do you feel about the resurgence of multiple physical formats to support each release – even if it’s on a limited basis – in the form of vinyl, tape, and CD? Do you feel the tangible differences when it comes to listening/absorbing music in these formats versus streaming or taking in music in digital formats?
Maik Nehrkorn (Vocals) – For us, the comeback so to say for vinyl and CD is a pure blessing. Streaming is still the most convenient way to consume music in any way and will stay this way. You don’t want to bring your vinyl player to the gym right? But the comeback of CD and vinyl also means that people want to commit to listening to a full length album again. The biggest benefit in streaming to us are playlists that give you instant access to multiple songs and artists delivering a specific mood. It is great for discovering new artists or just being surprised by what will be played next. If you start up a CD or put on a vinyl, it means that you would like to start the journey that the band actually has drawn up for the specific record. With GWTF we have put a lot of focus on having a musical story and a smooth transition from the beginning until the end. The fact that people are buying vinyl and CD again confirms us that this is also being appreciated next to playlist compatibility.
SOURCE – What’s on the agenda to support the album for the next year or so as far as touring, festival appearances, promotions etc?
Maik Nehrkorn (Vocals) – Get GWTF out to everyone interested! It’s as simple as that. We loved writing these songs but we especially love playing them live and seeing what translates to the people. (And what doesn’t) Therefore we look forward to the tour with Novelists in February 2024 which enables us to play our music in places we have never been before.
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