Interview: Eagle Owl
Eagle Owl is a rising Hip-hop artist from Canada who just released his summer single 'Red Ride'. Louder Than The Music chatted with the man behind the music to find out more about his plans for the future and what inspires his music.
For those who haven't heard of you before, can you tell us a bit about yourself and how you got involved in making music?
Yea! My name is Mikey I’m known on social media/music platforms as Eagle Owl as a Christian Hip-Hop artist from Winnipeg Canada. I’ve dabbled with music since middle school with my joke song ‘The World Is’ from a class project and it got notable on a few pages on the internet at the time and a few bigger Youtube celebrities. I got back into music after high school around 2019 working on a few singles and just playing around with what works over the years. I’m still trying to find my true sound but I think I’m getting closer and closer through more releases as I’m doing them.
Tell us about your new single 'Red Ride' and what the inspiration behind it was?
'Red Ride' I actually made last year when I went to my church bible camp growing up. I was working the summer there in 2021 during COVID as I just lost my job from COVID and I thought to myself one evening “I want to make some kind of radio hit song”. I found a great Instrumental on Youtube and was looking at a few popular songs and artists like Jon Keith, The Weeknd, 12AM and a few others. Then I was thinking what is something catchy and I somehow thought of the words Red Ride and how it can rhyme into it and how God wants us to find that special someone in our lives and then I got to working on the track. It probably took like a good week of writing that I got the hit song.
That song is taken from your latest EP 'Fireflies' what more can you tell us about that release?
For sure! ‘Fireflies’ is my new Hip-Hop experimental project that I made in the span of a year and wanted to drop for the summer. It was basically about all the past experiences I had with a few individuals over the past year and experiences I had facing with God. Like the track ‘I Fall (Holy Word)’ is about me falling off the path of God with forgetting about him and getting caught up with the devil. But I know that God will always be there to take me back knowing that tomorrow has its own troubles than worrying about todays. Matthew 6 verses 33-34.
What message would you like people to take from your music?
Experience It. Every message for a song and experience will be different. I’m not going to sugar coat my music or my life. Maybe I might talk about stuff that most people don’t talk about in typical day to day music but that’s about growing as an artist. All I tell people is to experience it and you may like what you're getting or you might not. Fans come and go and I’m open arms for everyone.
How would you describe your style of music and what are your influences?
As of right now I would describe my music Hip-Hop/R&B with some Christian influences and lyrics. Would you say I’m a Christian Artist? Sure. But I’m not going to limit myself to just those topics to every single song. That’s why I made Red Ride that yes there was some instances of God into the song but it’s good to expand on that and branch out as well. As for Artists for influences I have a huge range of influences. My favourite artists would be Breaking Benjamin, Bad Omens, True North, The Word Alive and a few other bands. There's a few of those bands/members who aren’t Christian but some have indicated that they might look into those views for some songs here and there. I love listening to Metal/Post-Hardcore/Alt. Metal just 'cause it's actual music and singing not screaming. As for Christian artists and hip-hop, I would say Thousand Foot Krutch, Scribe Music, Kurtis Hoppie, Kamban among a few others.
If you could work with any songwriter, who would it be and why?
It’s a tough question. But I think I would love to see myself work with Ben Burley from Breaking Benjamin one day if that ever happens. Even meeting him is my dream. I was thinking to myself a year ago and I still think of this even today if I ever get to his level of success or that level of fame with music. Why not bring all the big Metal/rock artists onto a Hip-Hop collab album. No one has done it but it would be new and interesting to see what can be made out of that. Ben is someone I grew up on with music next to Chad Kroger from Nickelback. To see something like that be made It would get so many communities, and genres together for a moment and just everyone in the world talking about it and say. "Hey did you hear that rock artist do hip-hop on that eagle owl record"? Would be cool.
How would you define success in your career as an artist?
Success to me as an artist you're selling out stadiums and touring. To get to that level and have full blown stadiums sing to your lyrics/songs without you saying a word is something everyone dreams about. I see so many Youtube videos from artists and I hope one day even with a little venue I do at a hometown show I see people singing to every one of my lyrics is something I hope comes about one day.
What is your favorite album of all time?
As someone who has listened to so many artists, and reviewed tons of bands/artists material over the years. I can't tell you. So many people even ask me this and I’ll never have a set straight answer. I can tell you what my favourite album of the moment is cause that changes for everytime for myself. As of right now my favourite record would be Bad Omens - The Death Of Peace Of Mind.
You're stuck on an island, it's hot, you only have enough battery life left to listen to one song on your phone. What track is it?
This is kind of the same as the last one as what's my favourite song of all time and I don’t have one but what is my “radio answer” for people so that they can accept it would Green Day - Boulevard of broken dreams. The song goes through so many emotions and different aspects it’s a good set stone answer I can tell people.
What does the next year hold for you?
A lot actually. I’m working on new music got another EP in the works called ‘INFINITY’ hopefully be out before the end of the year. But it’s going be way different compared to ‘Fireflies’ more R&B/Hip-Hop I can say so far what I’m hearing. Probably plan a hometown show release for that and see from there on what comes about. I’m also trying to plan out this next year or couple months possibly but I don’t know if it will happen now as flights and everything costs so much now, is some shows in different parts of Canada and the States. I want to expand out of my hometown Winnipeg for a couple shows to get my name out in different parts of Canada and the states. Hopefully, 'Red Ride' can help with that on some Radio stations now. Just keep up to date with myself on social media like Instagram @officialeagleowl on new music and possible tour updates in your city.
