It’s hard to believe that the slick pop-slash-R&B stylings of AudioDamn! germinated not from a Brooklyn basement or a Los Angeles warehouse. Instead, Oliver Wimmer, Ali Grumeth and Daniel Mudrack (Mud) are delivering their tunes straight from Germany. And while the trio may be young, the three are seasoned musicians, having played and toured together since 2007. Oliver and Ali had the same manager. “He used to call both of us, trying to convince us to form a band. After weeks of Ali rejecting his offer — Oliver had just been in a TV show — we finally agreed to meet and instantly discovered our common interest for live rock music. So we toured and eventually ended up with the first version of AudioDamn!” After they moved to Germany to study music, Ali completed the trio with his guitar-octaver-bass construction. Ali was screaming “YEAH,” experimenting with his gear for the first time.“Together it’s been developing into a fun and sweaty trio sound ever since.” Today, we're excited to give you a special behind the scenes look at their latest single, "Lights Out," and chat with the three-piece about influences, origins, and why they choose to sing in English instead of German.

Hometown: Oliver and Ali are from Vienna; Mudi from Berlin

Homebase: Mannheim/Germany

Where does the name AudioDamn! come from?

Actually we were called Amsterdamn! once, touring and playing shows in Germany and all over Europe. One day we received a call saying, “You can’t use that name.” So we said, “Well AudioDamn! is better anyway.”

Did the three of you grow up in musical households? How did you discover music?

Oliver: Music was always a big part of my life, though my parents aren’t musicians. But I think I wanted to become a musician because of a Green Day DVD that was shown on a TV in a skate shop in Vienna. I just instantly knew I wanted to do the same thing. So around the age of 14 I just picked up a guitar, started shredding and singing to it and it got a little better with time.

Ali: Not really. My mom had some LP’s of local stars and my dad had a “Genesis” and “Chicago” CD in his car. And as I was growing up I just felt like I should play electric guitar and somehow fell in love with music. But the music school in the small village where I spent my childhood only offered flute or acoustic guitar lessons with a chance to maybe play electric guitar someday once I was good enough. So that’s why I started playing classical guitar at the age of 8 … Five years later I finally got an electric guitar and started playing live with my first band.

Mudi: I started playing drums when I was 11 years old. I used to hit little boxes with pencils to Guns n Roses or Queen when I was 10. Later on, I discovered all the big jazz legends like John Coltrane… that’s why New York is still the one “music-city” for me. I’ve been there a few times before joining AudioDamn! and it was amazing.

Who are your biggest musical influences?

The three of us love bands like the Foo Fighters and The Black Keys… and mostly listen to great songs in many different genres of music. But we think our band also sounds the way it sounds because Oliver is a little more on the soul and R&B side (Ne-Yo, Justin Timberlake, Usher)... Mudi as well (D’Angelo, Erykah Badu) and Ali likes gritty rock tunes once in a while (Juliette and the Licks, Presidents of the United States).

What's "Lights Out" about? What inspired you to write it?

Oliver: "Lights Out" is about a girl that just keeps rejecting me and I’m kind of mad at myself about falling for her… It’s obsessive love in a way that you know that your mind is playing tricks on you, but you can’t do anything about it.

How do you write songs? What's the process like?

It can happen many ways. For Example “Lights Out” began as an acoustic ballad that Oliver wrote and was then squeezed and pushed to become a gritty rock song. The song was then recorded in a small dusty basement studio.Sometimes Ali and Oli collaborate coming up with something on the piano or with a drum-guitar-loop-riff-thingy We even did two or three sessions as a band or with outside songwriters. We try to stay open-minded and let the magic happen.

You’re from Germany but you sing in English. Is it common for German bands to sing English songs?

Quite a few bands in Germany sing in English. It’s a common thing, but not as common as in Scandinavia for example. We just always loved the sound of English and believe that languages can change the feel of a song completely. But there are a lot of great German-singing and rapping artists and bands out there.

Who would you love to collaborate with?

Dave Grohl!

What's the craziest band story you have so far?

We played a few shows in Ankara/Turkey. We had the craziest taxi ride on our way to the location. Though the driver initially responded “yes” to our question if he was able to bring us there, it became clear that he didn't know how to get there. So while driving around 80 mph through the city, zigzag-style (weird traffic there), he started yelling out the window to another cab driver, asking for directions. After some maneuvers that the Hoff himself would be very proud to have survived, he finally brought us there in one piece. The show and the people were amazing in Turkey. People stormed the stage and started dancing with us. Everyone was going crazy. One of the coolest and best gigs.

Are you working on an album right now?

We are at the finish line with our album and it’s been a fun ride cause we recorded a lot of the material when we were really fresh as a band. Ali produced it and most of it was recorded in a fun little dusty basement studio and also tracked live in that one room. The last few months have been kind of updating sessions — recording a few new songs or making the old ones better.