Since she stopped being a Heartless Bastard, singer-songwriter inspired

Erika Wennerstrom wasn’t accustomed to taking breaks. After 14 years as the leader of the Austin-via-Cincinnati rock troupe Heartless Bastards, she was used to plowing on with songs that ran from rustic and sometimes coarse immediacy to songs of sparse, poetic grace. The sounds shifted, the personnel rotated, but Wennerstrom remained at the helm — until this year.

After the band’s current lineup agreed to go on hiatus, Wennerstrom felt unexpectedly liberated. Not being the boss meant satisfying an impulse to make music that was totally hers without the added responsibility of being the head of a modest rock ’n’ roll enterprise.

“You know, I think I just sort of let go of ego,” she said. “I let go of worrying. I feel like I’ve always been honest in my music and on my albums, but sometimes it can be such a challenge to get to that place of honesty. So I let go of worrying about how creating a record affects other members of the band and affects other people’s lives. I didn’t realize I had that pressure in keeping things going for everybody. So letting go felt very free.”

Enter Erika Wennerstrom the solo artist. Lexington audiences, having had several concert glimpses of various Heartless Bastards lineups in performance over the years, got a preview of Wennerstrom at the Burl in June with a new band and new songs. With her solo debut album due out in the spring, she returns, but in a truly solo context. Wennerstrom performs a solo acoustic concert Friday night for Soulful Space at the Episcopal Church of the Good Shepherd.

“When Heartless Bastards went on break, I felt this huge burst of inspiration. All of a sudden, creativity flowed in a way that I haven’t had happen in a long time. It was a big relief. I didn’t understand how much I needed change until it was brought upon me.”

“What I really enjoy about these new songs is that I find they work just as well in a stripped-down acoustic environment as they do with the rock ’n’ roll versions that are going to be on the album. So it’s kind of fun to go back and forth and do these songs in an intimate setting and then with a band.”

With the album months away from release, even devout Heartless Bastards fans will be in for an evening of predominantly new and unfamiliar music. So, aside the acoustic vs. electric settings, how will the songs that she performs Friday night differ from the ruggedly uncompromising music she dispensed with the band she fronted since 2003?

“On this album, it’s sort of about self-love,” she said. “I always feel writing, for me, is like trying to grow internally. This is going to be an album of mantras to myself to be kinder to myself.”

Part of that kindness involves solitude and distance, at least when it comes to writing. She has been part of an always-active Austin, Texas, music scene for the past decade, but she said that’s not where she draws her primary inspiration.

“I tend to travel to write,” she said. “I really like going somewhere and isolating myself. For a lot of this upcoming album, I was out at Big Bend, which is a national park in West Texas. Melodies would come to me while I was hiking. I’d stay out there in West Texas for a week or two at a time.

“I was just listening to a voice memo. I have, like, 400 voice memos and none of them are labeled. So I was sifting through ideas that I liked that I haven’t worked on yet. I realized when I was doing that two days ago, how much I wrote out in West Texas for this album.”

Expect the travels and subsequent writings to continue. Even as her first solo album awaits release, Wennerstrom is plotting her next project.

“I feel more inspired than ever, so much so that I’m already working on another new album,” she said. “I’ve never written this quickly. I tend to take some time after I finish one project, but I’m just going right back into it. I’m just thinking to myself, ‘What am I waiting for? I should just keep going.’”

This story was originally published December 13, 2017 at 4:03 PM with the headline "Since she stopped being a Heartless Bastard, singer-songwriter inspired."