The Elevator Boys Talk New York Fashion Week, Dream Collabs and What’s Next

German TikTok stars Elevator Boys are rapidly coming up in the world, and with their budding musical careers as a boy band, they're about to get even bigger.

The guys got their start making viral videos filmed inside of elevators, and today, they have more than their 2.3 million TikTok followers to prove it. Earlier this summer, they released their debut single, "Runaway," and they even teamed up with the Jonas Brothers for one of their signature elevator vids. They were also recently in the states for New York Fashion Week, where our own fabulous host and producer Sienna Leone got the chance to catch up with them to discuss their musical future and so much more. Read the full interview below.

Sienna Leone: Tell me what you're all here for during New York Fashion Week.

Jacob Rott: We were invited to attend an event for the new release of the FC Bayern Munich Jersey from our friend, Achraf. He is a designer from our hometown in Frankfurt, Germany who collaborated on the jerseys. We're also going to the COS show and have some music-related meetings to attend while we are here. It's going to be an exciting week for us.

 

Sienna: You all just celebrated two years together. Can you tell me how you guys came together, and where the name Elevator Boys came from?

Tim Schaecker: That story goes both ways. So, we originally started as friends and we're all from Frankfurt, but Julian's from Nurnberg. So, we've known each other for like two, three years. I've known Luis for almost 10. We individually started doing TikTok videos, and then one day we came together and we're like, why don't we do content together? Then we started meeting up a few times, and our friendship grew closer. One day we were at the mall recording videos, and we wanted to go buy a drink downstairs. We took the elevator down and Jacob on that elevator ride did a quick video that ended up blowing up. So, we thought ha, elevators. A week later we went to the mall again and recorded specific content in the elevator a different way. Those videos performed well again, and people in the comments started calling us the Elevator Boys. Over time, we kind of got organically branded by that and we adopted the name. We were like alright, we're known as the Elevator Boys, so now we're the Elevator Boys.

Luis Freitag: Especially in the beginning, we kind of used it ironically to just make fun of ourselves and not take ourselves too seriously. And then we said yes, let's take the name.

 

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Sienna: Shout out to your fans for coming up with your name! What do you think are the pros and cons of using social media as a way to put out your music?

Luis: I think it definitely helps. At the end of the day, good music is going to perform well. You have to become artists and find a way and sound, and really create something that stands out that's just really good and people want to listen to. And of course, it helps to promote, but if the music isn't good, it won't last long. So that's our main goal to just make good music.

 

Sienna: Speaking of new music, can you tell us about the new single, "Runaway"?

Julian Brown: We just released our first single, "Runaway," but we've actually been doing music now for over a year. We went to the studio for the first time in L.A. and recorded three songs. Now we have over 20 songs. We chose "Runaway" to be our first single because we all really relate with the song. "Runaway" is about the person that grounds you and makes you forget the world around you. We haven't been able to see our friends and family as much. So, we know how important it is to take care of your loved ones, yourself, and your mental health. There is more coming, but we are really proud to put out our single.

 

Sienna: 20 songs! So busy. Where did the inspiration for these songs come from?

Bene Schulz: We're a group of five and we all have different music tastes and influences. We try to put it all together and have a great mixture of everything. Maybe it's something new that no one ever has released before us. That's the goal.

 

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Sienna: Where can your fans see you next?

Luis: Hopefully, more to come. We've started to have our first live rehearsals, where we went to the studio together with a band. We did live versions for the songs that we've made so far. The ones that we considered to be a second single one day. We are ready for our first performance, but we are deciding when to do it. Summertime Ball, which was super big—it set the bar high, and we want to go for something similar.

Bene: We really want to perform. We just released our first song, and now we are ready to perform.

 

Sienna: How did your collaboration with the Jonas Brothers come to be?

Jabob: It happened at Summertime Ball. We were in contact with their team, and we were both there. It was kind of funny, because we came up with the idea to fit two boybands in the elevator, so, we made it reality. Their team called us and told us they were ready now. We left our green room and ran 500 meters across the stadium to get there on time. We shot a quick video and then had to run back to get ready for us to go on stage to show off our song. They were nice and cool. Maybe one day we can do more with them and make some music.

 

Sienna: And talking about boy bands, what are your favorite parts of being in this boy band?

Tim: I think it's the friendship and everything that we've lived through for the past two years. We came a long way with founding our own artist management that represents us and living together for two years. Doing so many different projects, and now aiming for the biggest one that we ever did collectively, which is music. The journey of seeing us individually developing in our voices and sound. Also, getting closer to producing music that we really, really love. It's the journey that matters.

 

Sienna: Are you going to be spending more time in the U.S. performing?

Bene: Yeah, a lot of our community and fans are based in the U.S. So of course, we want to meet them and perform for them.

 

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Sienna: After the Jonas Brothers, are there any other artists you guys would love to collaborate with?

Julian: I would say David Guetta would be really cool, for a remix. Another artist I'd say would be Justin Bieber.

Jacob: That's the thing. I think I say in every interview that Justin Bieber would be a goal. I love him. Another guy whose music we really love is charlieonnafriday. He's an upcoming artist that would be a cool match. To be stuck in the elevator with or to record an elevator video with Jacob Elordi. would be cool He's doing a great job and I think he could fit well.

Luis: Especially after the last month, we want to collab with Fred Again. That would be amazing. I think it would be something totally new. So, I'd love to work with him and go a little bit more electronic and a little bit more artsy with the sounds that he creates. I think that will be amazing. For creating a video, I think I would love to do a video with Alex Turner from Arctic Monkeys. It'd be cool to play guitar together.

 

For even more from the boys, click HERE for our in-depth interview with them on their debut single, "Runaway."