"Can you hear the strings?" guitarist Tyler Burkum asks excitedly. It's after 10 p.m. two weeks before Christmas 1998 and Audio Adrenaline has invaded Tejas Studio, located on Gary Chapman's Nashville ranch, for the recording of their latest project, Underdog.Mark Stuart's voice fills the studio as he sings "This Day" to a freshly recorded track, complete with string quartet. Bass player Will McGinniss is behind a set of glass doors, glued to a computer running Avid Pro Tools. Rhythm guitar player Bob Herdman is home writing lyrics; drummer Ben Cissell is nowhere to be found, but is most likely taking a break after a few long weeks in the studio.Fast-forward to the present. After nearly six months in the studio--five months longer than their previous projects took to record--the men of Audio Adrenaline hae finished what they consider to be their best project to date.Ever since first signing with ForeFront Records, the group has churned out hits like "Big House" and "Never Gonna Be as Big as Jesus." With each album, Audio A's success and sales were steadily growing. Then, Some Kind of Zombie released in 1997--and marked the first Audio A album that didn't exceed the sales of its predecessor. In fact, salesfrom Bloom to Zombie dropped by more than 100,000 units in Christian bookstores alone. "We made a deeper record," McGinniss says. "For some it's been their favorite record; for other people, they were lost."Scott Brickell, the group's manager, believes the word "zombie" may have scared some people away. "You name that record Chevette and put a bunch of smiling happy go-lucky boys on the cover and it sells 200,000 more records."However, they do not consider it a mistake. "God knows prior to any of our albums coming out what He wants to do," McGinniss says. "We just have to trust Him to minister to the people He is supposed to."The boys went back to the drawing board to produce Underdog, an eclectic mix of styles found on Audio A's previous albums. "We were trying ot incorporate some of the things we loved from the past three albums," McGinniss says. "The anthemic and loop sounds of Don't Censor Me, the guitar-oriented rockness of Bloom, then we added what we've done with Zombie--being creative in the studio."Underdog also marks the guys' first attempt at producing their own material. "We produced seven songs on this record, and that's a big change," McGinniss says.And the change was less than easy. "We had to work through things together and fight and apologize," Stuart says. "It was really hard on us relationship-wise, but God worked through all of those things to create something better than if we has an outside producer for this [entire] album."Brickell believes producing helped open communication lines within the group. "It's caused them to take their ability to communicate to the next level," he says. "They have been on autopilot wehn it comes to going in the studio When you produce yourself, all those things go out the window and you've gotta start over."The result of many hard months in the studio is an album that explores the theme of how the world views Christians. "A lot of times people look at Christians as being the underdog, being the weaklings," Herdman says. "That's OK. To serve God you die to yourself and become a slave to Christ."Herdman goes on to explain the title Underdog actually has a double meaning for the band. "It's a little reminiscent about how we feel about ourselves. To a lot of people, we're a pretty big band, but we still [feel] not as talented as other bands. But, we've always worked hard to do the best we could and God's really blessed us"A new Audio Adrenaline record isn't the only blessing in McGinniss, Stuart and Herdman's lives. Together they have formed FlickerRecords.com, an independent record label with a strong emphasis on Internet marketing. Debut artist Riley Armstrong, who has already joined Audio A on the road on several occasions, will release his nationsl debut in early 2000.The three were introduced to Armstrong, a Canadian, by Hokus Pick; they were instantly impressed with his independent album. "It was great," Herdman says. "It's a cross between Steven Curtis Chapman and Beck. He writes a lot of really cool ballads like Steven, but he uses more loops."The label evolved out of the desire to help new artists like Armstrong. "Bob, Mark, and I have a vision to help younger bands the way we've been nurtured by people in our lives," McGinniss says."We see what God is doing through Gotee records, BEC and other labels," Stuart adds. "We see the heart behind those record labels, and we want to do that."Though there are a lot of Christian indie labels already out there, the guys at FlickerRecords.com don't feel threatened. "We have the leverage of Audio Adrenaline that we could use to promote our artists and record company," Herdman says. "It's all up to God eventually--He's going to decide if He wants it to fail or prosper."The three also see the label as their future. "We won't be doing Audio Adrenaline forever," Herdman says. "We look at Flicker as our future involvement in Christian music."But it doesn't appear Audio Adrenaline will be closing shop anytime soon. "I think AA's best moments are still ahead," Stuart says. "We are at the plateau. We are going to ride it and see where God takes it."
