Podcast Transcript
Ryan: Welcome to the Church Collective Podcast. In this episode, I had the opportunity to talk to Josh and Nate from Elevation Rhythm about their sophomore album. This is the Gospel, and if you have been paying attention to social media at all, you have seen that men, the music that they are putting out has really been resonating with people.
So I think you’re gonna be very encouraged by this episode. So here we go. Obviously, coming
Josh: off of growing Pains where we wrote that coming out of Covid and quarantine, and we knew where our kids were and what they were struggling with, and so we wrote songs that were more addressed towards.
Those feelings and what they were going through and trying to apply truth to that. But for this album, we wanted to start with truth and it’d be a Truth Center album. And what’s important is like our, everyone talks about how they, like y’all were the voice of the next generation, those things.
But that’s a very big responsibility. And we had to really ask ourselves, what are we teaching? Yeah. What are we teaching these youth? And as they’re building their foundation of faith what, how are we putting, helping them put language to that foundation? And so we just knew our next album.
We wanted it to be, we didn’t wanna write another song that didn’t didn’t address like what we believe, who we believe in, like all those very important core elements of who Rhythm is. And so that’s what this album was. Yeah. Very
Ryan: cool. How did you what did you go to? What were the things, obviously we’re gonna go to the Bible, right?
But like how did you determine, in seven songs, like how do you cover the whole scope of systematic theology or whate whatever you would choose? Like how did you go about that?
Josh: Yeah. And so that was the tough part because we didn’t, the album is not in totality oh, this is God, like the whole thing after book ever again.
Just listen to this album. No, I don’t think that’s what it was. I think it was. What are the sparks? What are ways that we can spark one, how can we address some of the simple things like salvation? Yeah. Baptism and purify or this is the gospel. Just telling the story and then talking about how Jesus dying on the cross was for me and you.
And so this, the song, this is the gospel was, that was like that go-to, and so we’re hitting on a couple of pillars. Yeah. And. Almost like when you’re writing it, the only song like streetlights was the one that was a little bit more coming, a little bit more tension. Cause I think that we, one thing rhythm we like to do is write songs that, like I said, like address that tension that people go through.
There’s not just always, everyone’s not just on the Sunday morning vibe every day though, having a song that really, it’s almost like a modern day particle sun where it’s Is that, that feeling of man, I need to come home. Like I need to get back to to the father. And so that kind of was in the middle of the album, your purpose to to almost tell Hey, we know, like on this journey, you wanna have those moments where you gonna have to come back.
Yeah.
Ryan: That’s great. I’d love to hear like you, you said too, there’s like this weight of we’re the, this is the next generation and they’re gonna bring. Whatever it is. But a lot of times it feels like regardless of generation, it’s just people trying to get their head around God. I’d love to hear just what is that tension like at your, at Elevation?
Like what, are there big issues that you’re finding in young people that you’re maybe not seeing in older people? Or what’s the tension there?
Nate: Yeah, I think if anything holds significance it’s because it was revealed to us first. None of these songs are from a place that we haven’t been.
And so I feel like the Lord, because we have said yes to him in such a unique space, specifically regarding the youth has and spending time with our young people at church has given us insight as to okay, we’re the next, if this is the generation’s, sound, the next generation soundtrack of Faith like, We’re at tables with them trying to understand what their language is as well.
So that the tension of that is it is honestly resolved by two things. It’s like real revelation from the Lord. Because if you go to the Lord, you’ll find his heart for his people. Specifically the people that we feel so assigned to, which are young people. And then two, it’s actually going with that information to them and sitting at the table and being like, Hey, what do you think about this?
What do you feel like? How would you describe this? Describe to me your emotions regarding this, that, and the third. And so our church does a very incredible job of, while we do release such music on a big space, it’s coming from little spaces like once every month. We have these rhythm nights and so that’s where we get to sit at the table with our young people and really eat and dine and talk and that’s where these things are birthed out of.
And I think that it lightens the pressure on us, cuz we realize it is, at the end of the day, it’s revelation. We get to put in song form.
Ryan: Sure. I know like when we talked with you guys on the podcast, maybe about a year ago, we talked about how rhythm nights look, but for those that may not have listened to that, and it’s probably evolved over this year, but maybe just give us a picture on what do those rhythm nights look like
Nate: now?
They’re still wild, I think. I think it’s really beautiful to see how specifically with the music, the young kids are connecting and we’re watching them grow up. And watching them also be able to sing the songs in different seasons of their lives. Yeah. Cuz we can have personal connections with them.
So Rhythm Nights are still crazy yet, like really beautiful and can be really simple. Just yesterday we had one. Oh it was, and it was wild. It, pastor Tim at gave a sermon and it wasn’t. Your typical youth sermon. It wasn’t fast paced, it wasn’t a lot. He sat down on the edge of the, on the edge of the stage and literally just presented the gospel as simple and plainly as it’s and flooded and people flooded.
The altar, young kids gave their life to Christ. So every rhythm night is something different which is what we want it to be. We feel like that’s what the Lord also has planned on our church is that there’s always something new. There’s so much more to him. So why settle and so rhythm nice.
Still look like that. We’re just trying
Josh: not it’s almost like you tried not to wait until summer camp to hit like that youth revival image. I think we wait for those summer moments where it’s just that’s the, that’s like the big thing. But I think yesterday we had rhythm by yesterday, but it was about salvation.
Like it was literally like, and it was like that big altar call moment that you usually see it like big summer camps. But we had it on a Wednesday night and I think that was special, that we’re not like, yeah, we’re not waiting into some big conference, like we’re really trying to bring revival in art.
And the opportunities that we get with our church every month.
Ryan: Yeah, that’s killer. I can hear the youth pastors listening to this saying like that’s their life. Like coming back from summer camp and trying to hold on to that summer camp vibe lasts for a week and then it goes away. What does the planning like look like?
Like what’s your team look like? Like how do tangibly, what would you tell this youth pastor that wants to hold onto it? What can they do to try to keep that energy going? Yeah, I think
Josh: It’s really about our curriculum is where we start. Our curriculum for what we take our youth through in our groups and stuff is, the first one at the beginning of the year was called Back to the Basics, and then this one’s called, this is the Gospel.
And so we’ve almost connected the songs that we sing to, the curriculum that our youth go through and their eGroups and then what our what our sermons are about on rhythm rights. And so it’s really about the consistency. And what we do is it’s not about something feeling different than the other thing.
It’s just like we, there’s a, they’re like, people are leaving Phil, but they’re also leaving like hungry for more and feels like this attention is so like we try to just we buy the men like try to get them bought into the, to the marathon of this whole thing and not like a you can lead being like, all right, you can never come back.
I know, I think there’s something about like people, like they want to come back because there’s so much. There’s so much teaching, there’s so much learning, there’s so much more yearning to go into what we’re teaching
Nate: with. And I would say that if you’re in youth ministry, know that 90% of what you’re gonna do is sell seeds.
And so for the youth pastor out there that maybe is, even now these rhythm nights, that this wasn’t always the case for the church. Sure. This might be the season that we’re in right now, but we’re seeing the, we’re. Harvesting seeds that were sewn way before any of us got here. And I think all of us are even on an individual level.
Our products, at some point, someone grabbed us from, we were a kit and when we were like a young person and preached the gospel to us and just now, years later you’re watching it, but it started there. And and so 100% continue to sow seeds, and be okay with. If I never see the reward, my reward is Christ. He is mine and is, and it’s an honor to preach about this gospel. Even if I might not see this kid for the next seven years, he might not come back or he might be annoyed, he might be a twrp in the back, but give it eight years and he might be the next Billy Grip.
You
Ryan: know that’s very true for you.
Nate: Continue to sell the seed from Twrp
Josh: to Billy. That’s what you’ve named. Hey
Ryan: Billy, I’m Torp. That’s that the name of the episode. That’s great.
Nate: Where Peter come off. Twrp.
Ryan: What? Like I, I asked the question cause it feels like we all asked the question, but what did we think young people want?
I’m even thinking like there’s, Asbury was like a whole thing for a little while now we don’t talk about it. And now I just like you guys living in the trenches with young people. What do you think their, what do you think they want their church to be maybe 10 years from now? What do you think their church is gonna look like?
Like what are you guys seeing?
Nate: I think we’re in a very different space than we were when I was growing up. When I was growing up. We wanted. Church to be relatable. We wanted the hype that church never had. We wanted the excitement that church never had. And I think now everything is exciting and young people want the real thing, even if it’s presented in the most simple way, which is why we have moments like last night where the sermon wasn’t crazy.
There wasn’t a nuts, like some out of the box illustration. Yeah. It was the first time someone probably sat down with them and just talked to them. And was honest with them. They want some, they want something that is tangible. They want something that is presence filled. They want something that’s different than anything else.
And we live in a world where yes, we should be relatable. Yes. We should do everything excellently onto the Lord. And yes, we still do creative stuff. We do that all the time. Sure. And even that, it’s coming from a it needs to come from a healthy place. You can’t just do things because you think that’s what they want.
What they want is the real thing. And you start there. Yeah. They want someone that actually won’t be afraid. It teaches them to not be ashamed of the gospel because in this world where you can’t really, you might not be able to say anything. They want someone that’s actually gonna stand up for what they believe in.
They want the real thing. And I think that’s why Asbury. Even looking at where it’s at in the Bible belt, which is where the majority of Christians live in the usa. Yeah. That is the complete opposite of everything that we’ve seen the Western Church try to be within the last 10 years. Yeah. It was the old wooden chapel.
And not saying that everything has to be that way, but it goes to show. That’s that purity is what got us back. Cuz sometimes, I mean it’s the Mary and Martha thing, it’s yeah we can be really good Martha’s, but at the end of the day, Mary chose the greater portion and just sitting at their feet, at Jesus’ feet.
So I think they want the real thing. They want adoration, they want something that’s gonna last. Everything is so quick in this world, right? Everything will be gone and built overnight. And then we’ll fall overnight. And you can tell when even leaders are leading from a place where they’re like, you’re just feeding me what I want.
You’re not necessarily giving me the bread of God. Yeah. And so they want the real thing for the first time in a long time. It’s a young generation that’s not hungry for antics or games. Sure. They just want something real. They don’t want entertainment. Yeah. No, that’s
Ryan: deep. Hopefully that’s resonating with somebody listening in trying to figure out, cause I know that’s the.
Proof coming from a guy, I spent 20 years in worship ministry as well, doing all the attractional things, and that’s even now, like my default is often that’s, how do we figure out how to do the cool thing when Oh yeah. It is literally just the gospel and people respond to that.
Nate: Yeah. But where we all do it. We all and there’s time and a place for it, right? Sure. There’s time and place for it. Like you said, the days are over of that being the default. And there was a season where that was actually like, where it rightfully was the default. Cause people just weren’t, they wouldn’t come to church, right?
And so even so many CH churches post covid, it’s like, how do we get people back? How do we get people back? And I think the, we’re learning that a successful ministry, specifically youth ministry, might not be necessarily about retention, but it might be walking out Monday through Saturday with people.
And then when they get to the house of God, they’re gonna be in a place of, in a house of worship, they’re gonna be in a place of receiving what we know is the real thing. So it’s a different thing and there’s always adjustments, re realigning that happen in the body of Christ, especially in different areas and different cultures.
I think we’re in one right now and we feel the tension of it, but there’s glory and salvation on the other side of it, man.
Ryan: Yeah, no, that’s incredible. To keep going down this line a little bit, you talked about like living Monday through Saturday. What does like discipleship look like for you guys?
Because that’s a big piece too, is it’s not about just that, just the rhythm night. That’s not the end all, but what’s it look like for relationship with your students?
Nate: The Bible says in the verse that Jesus went to Capernaum and as he was there, he, the longer he was there, he grew compassion for the people.
I think specifically one of our team members that’s really good at this is Bella. Bella is, she sings, you’ll be saved. And with the same enthusiasm that you see Bella leading from the stage, you won’t see Bella in the office one day and you’ll be like, what is she doing? And she’ll, you’ll check her Instagram.
And she’s sitting down with a group of 10, 14 year olds that are like, she’s really doing it. And like we, she’s even, and Josh has been incredible at taking the initiatives to put people like me and Bella in charge of, like I do, I help out with the young adult side of things and I gather with young people.
When I’m in town, we’ll get everyone together and I think that discipleship looks like everything outside of Sunday. I think the body of Christ gets together on Sunday to obviously adore him and then receive encouragement for what we do Monday through Sunday. It’s almost as sending out like the upper room, the very first church service was ascending out.
And then from that, the discipleship look like it’s simple stuff like eating together, like literally hanging out and learning how to love each other and grow love for each other. I think that with youth that’s so important. You have to like, meet them where they’re at and be okay with that. And not do it from a place of pity, but actually grow compassion for the people that you’re with by staying with them long.
And we don’t know how to do that. We don’t know how to sit with people anymore. So discipleship is so vital and it requires wisdom. It requires sacrifice itself. It requires to swallow your pride. And like even especially cuz you’re gonna hear some really ugly stuff. You can’t expect this to be like a nice little.
eGroup and then like just, sugarcoat stuff. This is no, people are dealing with real stuff, especially these young kids. They’re dealing with issues that we didn’t deal with until we were in our twenties, at 16, 17. Cuz they have access to so much. So being real with where they’re at and real with where we are at is so huge and gathering.
There’s so much power in just being around, being present for each other, even on a team level. That’s, we’re on tour right now, and it’d be easy to rip each other’s faces off. We’ve been living on a bus for two and a half months together. But I’m still respectfully, I’m still not tired of Josh.
That’s awesome.
Ryan: And that’s rare,
Nate: right? That’s rare. Yes. But it’s because I know him and I love Yeah. And it’s a blessing to be able to do that. Discipleship is so important. And it feels like it’s a lost art, but there’s hope because we’re learning how to sit at the table of the Lord again with each other.
Yeah. Oh, that’s awesome.
Ryan: So come back to the album a little bit. I’d love to hear just maybe a little bit of the recording producing process. How did you guys, we’ve got a lot of people on our audience that are like super into that. Your point. I’ll tell you, I know genius, this is Josh’s thing.
So maybe just give, I know that there’s gonna be people listening for some of Josh’s genius here. So maybe give any fun little stories or little parts that like really cool things that came, or like that were part of putting this together.
Josh: Yeah, we started writing it last year, like in June I think of last year, like probably right after we did our last interview, we started writing our next album.
Yeah. But on the production side, we, I knew I wanted this to be a live album cuz our last album was mostly studio. Yeah. And I, there was just like an energy that I just wanted the sonic, I wanted to play with. And us doing. Two drums was probably the biggest thing in a choir.
I was like, I knew I wanted two drums and I knew I wanted in a choir and yeah. We like built this whole set
Nate: for,
Josh: Like our top, so we have two drums, Tony notice, and they both can play like the kit. And I’m like I need someone to play the kit, but like standing up. Yeah. So I built like a standing version of a drum set and it was a kick drum.
A kick drum that was turned upside down. Like a bunch of like lower Toms and we spent days just on drums. Like I, we probably spent three days just working on drums on this album. And I love it. And I think people can hear it on the album that Oh, for sure. It’s very intentional
Ryan: though. And they play off each other really yeah, it’s
Josh: awesome.
Yeah. And then we went to one of our local colleges and then we got with the gospel choir. And then we just spent time with them. I had all the choir samples, like I knew what I had. You can use like keyboard patches and like little fake choir. So I knew what I wanted the choirs to do.
And then we had a rehearsal and we taught it in them. They came in the day of and we we recorded them and it was just, it was being able to like, use different color. I know I probably talked about this last time, but using different colors. Yeah. And I like to choose the colors before I even.
Know what I wanna do with them yet I’m like, I don’t know how this is gonna work, but I know I want these drums. I know I want this choir, I know I want this. And then it’s literally just a, it’s like a challenge. It’s, I look at creating an album as like a, as a fun challenge. It’s I, this doesn’t make sense yet, but if I can get this to make sense, this would be great.
And so That’s awesome. Yeah. So we did the live recording in this little room in the back of our office. We didn’t go to one of our church, one of our campuses. We have this room, like a meeting room. In our elevation offices. And it’s not meant for a live recordings. Yeah. And I literally just told her, I was like, Hey, I wanna do my live recording in here.
And they’re like you can’t, that’s not a, that’s not a music video. I was like, oh, we’ll figure it out. And so we like brought in a sound system. We hyped and draped everything. And then yeah, we recorded maybe 110 people in there. It was hot. Yeah. But he packed everybody in this little wind.
And we did the album that night and we probably did more songs than it what ended up on the album. But yeah, that was a, that was the bulk of it. And then, like I said, streetlights came later on. I just found that song in the middle of a writing session. But yeah, recording that album was probably, it was fun because I’ve never done a live recording.
Like a true live recording album before. So that was my, this is my first Oh, wow. Like album of ever produced.
Ryan: Yeah. What a, but just high quality for your first one for sure. Nice. So congratulations. That’s awesome. Yeah. Thank you. I I I’m a part of the belonging co college here. And so a bunch of our students, like before our chap chapels every Tuesday, will play praises without fail.
Every that’s just and they’re just bopping and they’re running with it. And I would be remiss to not ask about that baseline that everybody’s sharing and like students are trying to, yeah. Like where did that come from? Cause
Josh: I it’s almost one of those things.
This is what I love our band. That was actually in the track. That was the demo track and, but it was hidden. Yeah. Nick was able, or basically Nick was able to like to pick it out and Syd and I, our band always does this thing where they’ll listen to a beat we made and be like, I wanna play that.
I wanna play that, take that out the track. I wanna play that part. I wanna play the part. I think, yeah I’m pretty sure David, when the producers on that song, I think he had that part in there already. Nick just pulled it out and made it come from this background idea and brought it to the forefront and made it a bass lick that like, it’s almost like a staple in the song, but Sure.
It’s just having a band that has, they don’t hear our production. Like when I make a song, cuz we, most of our writing stuff I usually make the track and it’s pretty fleshed out before it gets to the band. And a band doesn’t just jam on top of a beat. And that’s yeah, that’s one thing that we don’t do.
We don’t just like, oh, this song’s already done, so let’s just jam on top of it. Yeah. They figure out how to pull, they listen for things. They pull things out. They’ll probably tell me, Hey, let’s, I’ll replace this sound, or I’ll add the, I’ll double this sound. And like they really infuse their instruments in the instrumentation into the track.
And that’s what I think has been game changing for us.
Ryan: Yeah. That’s killer. How do you did it come like that? How did you foster that attitude and that team? Because I now, there’s gonna be a worship leader listening to me. Like I’m lucky if my team even plays what they hear on the track.
But like how on earth did you get ’em to get your team to this place? I
Josh: think it’s, I think it was a little bit of both. I think they understood that, okay, this isn’t really worship music, and so it’s not gonna be like a four court jam session Yeah. Type of song. And so there’s a lot of.
And then they’ll get Tony the percussions. He kinda got mad at me a couple times cuz I was making him play things that he didn’t. He was like, I don’t even know if that’s ally possible, but cuz I would see an instrument and I would see all the possibilities that the instrument can do. And I think that’s what the, that’s what we started to do is that it was a back and forth between was like, okay, what can your guitar actually do?
Can it make a. Can your guitar sound like a organ? Can your like, and it was like that kind of, and then exploring their old instruments made them feel more creative in the process rather than it being like, Hey, I just need yours, standard clean tone or this, or I just need like a standard root, no bass playing.
So it’s I think it comes from you helping them as a leader or a producer as an md, letting ’em know that their instrument and what they have is more than just. Oh. Which let’s actually chase what this instrument can do. Yeah. And how can that benefit the song? That’s
Ryan: great. What, so these guys have been on tour for a couple months, like what are you, what any fun stories from that?
Any, what are you seeing just while you’re out so much?
Nate: Yeah, I mean it’s, I think Aaron is a different story. Like last week Dallas was like such a refreshing week for the team because we got to see so many friends and make so many memories together. And then, If you were in San Antonio, we talk about how San Antonio was such an impactful show because it was the first show that we did after the album released and we were singing up until then, songs that were technically unreleased, like we would, we put praises in the set.
We put there’s the gospel in the set. And then to, it was only like a week or so after the album release and when praises started, everyone knew it already. Yeah, that’s it. And this is Gospel was gone. Everyone knew it. We were like, whoa. Like sometimes you forget because we’re such a close-knit family and we’re in Charlotte and we’re cooking and we’re grinding.
We forget that these are more than just Dropbox files. Like people actually hear these and people actually meet God through them. Yeah. And so it’s been such an encouragement and so humbling like. I think the, all the stories, there’s a ton. We’re absolutely, we’re balls.
Josh: We’re on two tours at the same time.
Yeah. Oh, no. Nights was happening. So we’re a part of that. And then great church close. And so the craziness that happened was I was in on Elevation Nights in Fort Wayne, Indiana. I think you were in Oklahoma City and we’re supposed to fly over. And I was, we’re a group of us were gonna go over to the other tour and a flight that canceled yeah.
That night because of weather. And so we had to leave the Elevation Nights tour in the middle. Oh, sorry. Leave the Elevation Knights tour in the middle of the show and then drive to Indianapolis, which was like three hours away. Yeah. And then fly at three or four o’clock in the morning to like Denver and then somehow dry, like it was like chaos.
And we got people gone and they had the it go in Toronto. And so I think it was the craziness of us doing two different shows, but With Toronto, it was just like certain people didn’t have passports and so we had to swap in the middle of it and wow. It was chaotic, but it was actually like funny.
What else can you do? I was like, what can you do? Was
Nate: just laugh, like just to go. We were at a, doing an arena tour and everyone’s been here prepping all day, and I, and it is six o’clock, we have a seven o’clock start time for rhythm. And Josh is walking into the arena with his bags let’s go. This show, no closed city and I’m
Josh: all, I’m here in Toronto,
Nate: like in a different country.
Yeah. That was crazy, but, and you don’t realize it until after. Because it’s, we’re just like locked in. We’re like, oh yeah, this is what we do and we’re having the time of our life.
Josh: Yeah. It’s so fun. I was telling someone, they were like, how you guys doing? Are you guys tired? I was like, nah, we’re having the time of our life.
Like in two years from now, we’re probably thinking about how crazy this was, but Right. Right now we’re just like in it. We’re understanding that elevation rhythm isn’t elevation Church isn’t elevation worship. Like we still have a lot of grinding. And a lot of growing people are still finding out about us.
Yeah. Yeah. And so we don’t assume that oh, y’all know who rhythm is cuz we got elevation in our name. And so what happened the top of our life building this ministry and not like
Ryan: taking it for granted. Thank you so much for listening to this week’s episode. As always, just head on over to Instagram, shoot us a dm.
We would love to connect with you. God bless you today.