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Band page - Poverty's No Crime
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 Band Profile
What is your name and your current position in the band?
My name is Heiko Spaarmann and I am the bass player.
How would you categorize the style of the band? And did you ever consider or try playing other styles of music than the one(s) you are playing now?
The music of Poverty's No Crime is often referred to as Progressive Metal. Some say it is more Progressive Rock. I guess it is a bit of both in the music. We used to describe it as Melodic Concept Rock. However, I think it is definitely a great deal of metal to the music.
As regarding the band Poverty's No Crime the musical style we are playing has not changed dramatically over the years. Personally I started my career as a musician in a Jazz Rock band. After that I was part of a progressive Death Metal band which had quite some musical similarities to bands like Death or Cynic. In the end the music I make with Poverty's No Crime reflects more the kind of music I prefer listening to personally.
What is your latest album and why should people buy it?
Our latest album is entitled Save My Soul. People should buy it because it is a pretty cool piece of melodic progressive metal!
Tell us about the history of the band. More specifically, when was the band formed, how did you meet, and have there been any particular highlights or low points in your career, any crucial events that have taken you where you are today?
Poverty's No Crime was founded in 1991 by Volker Walsemann (vocals & guitars), Marco Ahrens (guitars), Christian Scheele (bass), Marcello Maniscalco (keyboards) and Andreas Tegeler (drums). The first tentative musical steps were taken in their first demos. "My Favourite Delusion" and "Perfect Wings", with their first and most encouraging success coming in 1992 when they won the Newcomer Rockfestival organized by the North German radio station "FFN".
Shortly after the band put their point over live to the public, as support to bands such as Depressive Age and Waltari, and took the opportunity of underlining their unusual talent. In the mid-90s the band signed for the Berlin record company Noise Records, who were known in the eighties as being the label of such German metal giants as Helloween and Gamma Ray. Their debut album, SYMBIOSIS, recorded in the T&T-Studios in Gelsenkirchen and produced by John McGowan (Headhunter etc.), was released in Spring 1995 and was warmly greeted by the press. "With this homogenous, deep and convincing CD debut, Poverty's No Crime have more fulfilled their inherent promise and have formed a solid foundation for their future", praised ROCK HARD, one of Germany`s two mega-metal-mags. The combo then began preparation for THE AUTUMN YEARS. Spring 1996 saw the release of their second album and once again the review pages of the metal press glowed with praise.
This time, the ROCK HARD reviewer named the CD his Album of the month, whilst EMP, in their catalogue-mag raved, "Proggers of all shapes, color and sizes simply must buy the album of this absolutely unique band". THE AUTUMN YEARS was received with positive reactions not only in Germany, but also abroad. BURRN, Japan`s Heavy Metal-Bible, gave the album 88 out of 100 points and readers voted the Germany into the Top 20 of the Album Charts. The album had scarcely been released than the musicians - despite a distinct lack of suitable financial support from their record company - went on tour with Victory and followed this up with a special guest slot on the Virgin Steele/Angra-Tour Poverty's No Crime tour which covered half of the European continent in 1996.
Tremendous praise was showered on the band following their live performances in Spain, Portugal, Italy, Greece and Switzerland. Despite all this, Noise Records surprisingly ended their relationship with the band, yet the lads were more determined than ever before and gave more live shows, one of them with Skyclad. After a generous break to consolidate their ranks, the five musicians continued to follow their dream and, from January 1997, began writing songs for a new album. Poverty's No Crime found a new business (and ideological) home at Inside Out, currently Germany`s most important Prog-Metal label, who also have such great bands as Spock`s Beard, Symphony X, Vanden Plas, Platypus (feat. members of Dream Theater and King`s X), Enchant and Eldritch under their contractual wing. Inside Out are known of signing only a certain, carefully and selected contingent of bands, whom they know they can support with great enthusiasm. In view of this, the liaison between Poverty's No Crime and Inside Out seems to be under a lucky star.
Reviewing SLAVE TO THE MIND, the first result of this hopeful relationship, "(Hardrock & Metal) Hammer", Germany`s Nr. 1 rock music magazine wrote in their August `99 edition, "This is what makes progmetal enjoyable - no long egoistic solos, no disturbing breaks, no endless I-love-me arias, but just - despite opulent decoration - straight arrangements, memorable hooks and melodic choruses... Some of the material remind me of the glorious Marillion days ("Wind And Light"), some of early Fates Warning ("The Senses Go Blind"), and yet SLAVE TO THE MIND never loses its own individual touch. A great album from a great band!" In the late 1999 Poverty's No Crime faced the first major line-up change when Marcello Maniscalco on the keyboards and bass player Christian Scheele left the band for other projects. Unimpressed by this loss, new material was written just by the remaining three musicians.
However, just before entering the studio for the recordings of ONE IN A MILION the right guy for the vacant position behind the keyboards was found: Jörg Springub proved his perfect fit for the band with an impressing performance on the record. ONE IN A MiLLION was released in June 2001 and once again the international music press showed remarkably positive reactions. Right after the album-release bass player Heiko Spaarmann completed the line up and the combo played some successful shows together with bands like Vanden Plas, Zero Hour, Pain Of Salvation and Anathema.
Two years later Poverty's No Crime took a deep breath of fresh creativity. Again they spent two month at the Soundgarten Studio and the result hit the record stores in 2003. In the end of October 2003 THE CHEMICAL CHAOS, the bands` fifth record was released in Europe as well as in North America via Inside Out Music. It received overwhelming positive reviews in the music press such like "album of the month" in Germany's METAL HEART, "10x dynamite" in the ROCK HARD magazine and many more. With this and a bunch of club and festival gigs booked to support THE CHEMICAL CHAOS the band suffered from an unforeseen setback due to health issues. Volker had to pause from all band activities for more than a year.
Besides some ongoing songwriting this caused in fact a break until the year 2005 when the band got back together and decided to start the preparations for a new album. In March 2007 the band entered the Area 51 studio in Celle, Germany which is run by producer Tommy Newton. Nine brand new songs reflecting the stylistic variety of POVERTY'S NO CRIME were recorded. The outcome is the sixth album entitled SAVE MY SOUL.
Was there ever a time when you wondered if your band would remain just a local outfit and never make it in the industry?
With the overwhelming response to the first demos and the immediate signing of a record deal in the beginning of the 90s it became clear that the band found an outstanding sound and had a fast growing fan base supporting the band. However, I guess that just happened without anyone in the band ever had imagined that it would come this way. It just happened...
Can you share with us one or two of your favourite moments with the band?
A great moment together with the band was the show at ProgPower Europe some time ago. That was a great experience being on stage with an amazing crowd in front of us.
Besides that every time we meet for rehearsals is a great moment for me it is always like 'coming home' when working together with the other guys, working on new song ideas or practicing for the next gig.
How is the writing process in the band?
We start with new songs usually based on individual ideas from one band member. That can either be a single riff or almost a complete song. Usually these ideas are developed at home, recorded on the computer and send out to the rest of the band. The good thing about working that way is that the one with the initial idea for a song can always build all the other instruments around his own instrument on the computer. This gives a variety of choices in trying out different things on the different instruments. When the others receive the ideas everybody is working mostly on his own instrument, developing it further, sending the file around again and so on and so on...
When we meet to rehearse it is mostly very clear what to play and there is no need to work on songs in the rehearsal room a lot as regarding jam sessions to develop songs. As we have only limited time for the music besides our daily jobs this is a very effective way to work and it has proved to work for us on the last two albums.
The lyrics and vocals are always the last thing to be written. Usually this takes place in the weeks before we go into the studio or maybe even just when we are already recording an album.
What brought you on the path to becoming a musician? Did you ever consider or take any other paths through life besides music?
We all are very interested in music and have been listening a lot to music even before learning an instrument. I guess no one initially really planned to be in a band that is releasing albums. For all band members being a musician is not the main job as we are not earning money by making music with Poverty's No Crime. So we all had to choose another path through life besides music. Personally I am working for a music distributor in Germany which is also the same industry and somehow connected to being in a band. However the others are working for example as teacher, architect or computer programmer which has not so much to do with making music. It works out anyway.
Do you have any idols? If yes, who?
I don't have any idols I must admit. I like some bands, singers or bass players more than others, however, that is restricted to the music. I don't think it is a good idea to give up yourself by striving to be like someone else. Be yourself and be content with what you are!
Do you have any regrets looking back at your career? For example any songs or even full albums that you regret recording? If so, what made you regret it?
No regret whatsoever. Every single bit we've done over the past years has been the best we could do at that time and I cannot remember that there was anything we did with knowing that it was wrong. From that perspective I think you have to stand for that even a couple of years later when things changed in the meantime.
Are there particular songs in your catalogue that the fans love but you're not particular fond of yourself?
I guess this is something that can easily happen to bands which are touring a lot. For example AC/DC must be fed up with playing Highway To Hell. As we are not touring a lot I am always very thankful when fans come up to me and demand that we should play a certain song. That is at the same time a sign that there are actually songs which are respected more by the fans than others.
How important do you rate the lyrical side of your albums?
I am normally not looking into the lyrical side of the music a lot. Honestly, that is not really important for me as long as we are not singing about shallow love stories and make rhymes like "fire-desire" ;)
What do you think about the state of the music industry today?
The state of the music industry can be reduced to one statement: Illegal downloading sucks. We are definitely suffering extremely from illegal downloads. Our album was made available on a file sharing platform by a journalist two weeks before release and had massive downloads according to the file counter. That has the effect that we are selling less albums and might not get the chance to record another album by our label. Legal downloads are far away from compensating the loss from decreasing physical sales.
Everybody who obtained our music by illegal download is not a fan!
What do you think is the best way to fight music piracy?
Establish an awareness that piracy and illegal downloads are harming the artists the most and that illegal downloading is committing a crime like stealing a car. People have the awareness that stealing a car is not OK, stealing music is the same thing but people have no sense of wrongdoing!
Do you have a life philosophy? If yes, what is it?
There is not something that I use as a guideline. Sometimes I am hesitating to do certain things which are besides the normal way life goes day in day out and then I often have to convince myself to 'just do the things' that are coming up in life which are unusual. If that makes sense to anyone.
Can you describe a typical day in your life?
Getting up, driving to work, working, driving home, sleeping. That is pretty much all I am doing during the week. Sounds quite ordinary to me. Nothing special in my life even though I am playing in a band ;)
What do you like to spend your time with besides music?
Any kind of sports if I have the time to do that. I like running and swimming and try to find time for doing that at least two times a week even though that is not always working out due to the lack of time.
What's the craziest thing that has ever happened on a tour?
Since I joined the band seven years ago we haven't really been on something that you can call a 'tour'.
You're heading off to live on a deserted island for a couple of years with your portable entertainment system... Which albums, movies or books would you bring? (Max. 3 of each)
As I am usually reading a book and watching a movie just once I should go for three CDs. Right now that would be:
Pink Cream 69 - In10sity
Heed - The Call
Threat Signal - Under Reprisal
What is your favourite joke?
Lately some scientists managed to interbeed sheepdogs with sheeps. - Now they can take care of themselves.
Can you tell us about any future plans for you and your band?
We would like to play some shows to support the new album Save My Soul. That will take place in the beginning of 2008. Maybe a new record in 2009. However, there are no plans made in detail yet.
Thanks for answering these questions. Now you are free to write a few lines to our readers.
Thanks for the interview and the interest in the band!
Check out our music on MySpace at www.myspace.com/povertynocrime
Spread the word about Poverty's No Crime to all of your friends if you like the music an make sure to pay for the music if you like it. By the CD or download it from a legal platform. That's the only way we can keep on making music and recording more albums!
If you want to book us for a concert anywhere in the world, don't hesitate to contact us directly. As we are not working together with a management or a booking agency that is highly appreciated! Thank You!
Added by Steen - 10/8/2007
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