Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Lyndon Ehlers. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Lyndon, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. When did you first know you wanted to pursue a creative/artistic path professionally?

When I was nineteen I landed a job working in a TV production studio, an independent news contractor specifically. I worked as a production assistant and later promoted to a video editing position working on local newscasts for cities in other states. At the time I was also playing music and had been struggling to understand self-promotion and how to stand out in the extreme metal genre. Working in television production introduced me to a lot of new skills such as video editing, working with microphones and even simply sticking to a strict schedule. These are all things that I realized can be applied to my music career. Being in a band is expensive when you’re paying other people to design you websites, design your t-shirts and album art. When I realized I could start doing things myself, it made my goals in music much more realistic.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

My name is Lyndon Ehlers, I live in Davenport, Iowa. Im thirty-four years old and have been a musician since I was fourteen. My friend Dan Freitag and I formed a barbecue themed death metal band called Pit Lord. That probably sounds pretty weird. Most people aren’t even going to know what ‘death metal’ is, I’m sure. Even in the world of extreme music, people aren’t always sure how to react.

Metal is a genre that often takes itself a bit too seriously. Crossed arms and frowns, jagged spikes protruding from raggedy denim, not a single giggle for miles. Of course this isn’t how these people are outside of band photos, but the genre almost requires pretend time. The music is aggressive, so should be the concepts, imagery, etc. While we are, and have been huge fans of this sorta thing since childhood, we got kind of sick of doing it with our own music. The band was started as a fun, goofy project alongside our usual gig and inevitably took over once all other projects ran their course. Two guys and pre-programmed drum-tracks, screaming about how awesome it is to grill burgers and have cookouts. We didn’t expect it to work. We formed in 2018 and have since released two Eps and two full-length albums on multiple formats, all on our own with no label support. We learned how to self-promote and navigate through an over-saturated genre and will continue as long as our backs don’t totally hurt.

For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?

People’s reaction to what we do is probably my favorite aspect of it all. Anytime we play somewhere new, there’s a guy spilling his beer as he exclaims his brother would love us and smokes meat every weekend. We’ve even been sent videos of our fan’s kids singing our lyrics in the car. Its pretty amazing actually. At this point, we’re just trying to find new ways to keep that going.

Any insights you can share with us about how you built up your social media presence?

When we first appeared on social media as a band we didn’t have any actual music ready to release yet. We were determined to build an audience regardless. Being huge dorks we made fun comedic videos and posted on all platforms daily. It nearly liquified my brain working that much on top of having a regular job. In the end, when it came time for our debut live show it was huge. We won our local market with videos of us in front of a green screen.

Contact Info:

• Website: pitlordbbq.bandcamp.com
• Instagram: pit.lordiowa
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pitlordbbqparty
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@pitlord5517

Image Credits
Dark Oracle Arts Jason Grevas Lyndon Ehlers