Band: ASP
Interview door: TekNoir
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Lucy asked ASP about their new single and the concept behind it.
Let’s go back in time for while. More precisely, back to 1999. Ten years ago, the era of ASP had begun. How did you start?
ASP: Initally all started with frustration. Matze and me started the project after we have been involved in various other projects. But none of them really worked out that well. The previous bands had split up and we have been in a mood of stopping it all. That kind of frustration with a „we’re-never-going-to-make-music-again“-attitude has lasted only 2 or 3 days. Then we both realised that life is music for us. We decided to work together in the lack of other options, bascially.
"Das Zwerk" is the name of the former basement-studio. There you have recorded the first CD „Hast Du Mich Vermisst? – Der Schwarze Schmetterling“. Followed by the absolute hit „Und wir tanzten“, which has filled the dancefloors of the clubs in that time. Initially you had planned to cut that song from the album. Why?
ASP: With the first album all is fresh and new, so is the collaboration with the partners we found. Then you have the anticipation of doing all 100% and to make everything fit together perfectly. So we had that misbelief for a short time, that this song was to extreme and unusual to fit onto the record.
But it had been the right decision to put it on the album. Not only because we had this song, but primarily we thought that we do not subject ourselves to those conventions set for the genre. If we don’t like a song, this is another issue. Then we keep working on it until we all are happy with it, no matter what a label or other people think about. But if a song is great, he fits us automatically. There is no „That’s no match“, because all stuff we like, is good enough to be ASP material.
Did you expect that song to be such a massive clubhit?
ASP: You never expect any success and to quantify success is even harder. I think, everybody wishes every song to be successful in terms that people love to listen to it. To know that this song means a lot to many people even today is more important to me than any clubplay statistics. This is invaluable and overwhelming, that this song has his own space in the record archives and the hearts of the people. That’s what we make music for.
Which song do you reckon to be as second most important hit-song besides „Und wir tanzten“?
ASP: I guess this is a very tricky question and something other people should judge about.
I don’t want to be arrogant, but we have a lot of many good songs, also many hits. Most likely „Ich will brennen“ is one the most requested songs live. But I personally believe that I can write the next big hit tomorrow, next week or next year. The sky is the limit. Especially with our new single I have a very good feeling. „Wer sonst“ has a lot of potential to become a major hit. We will see..
After the release of your debut you have played many smaller gigs. How did you feel back then when you played live and how did people react?
ASP: At the first gigs there had been some 50 or 100 people. I think this had been really good that we were able such a crowd at the very beginning. But we have worked hard for it, too. Since then, many things have changed and I am a bit happy about that. I really like the familiar atmosphere, but on the other hand it is also enjoyable to perform a show in the way you like.
I am not so much nostalgic about the very small gigs. There are a few that I do not want to experience again today. It was never an issue of the audience but of the venue and promoters, that refused to provide sufficent equipment and such stuff. If you can not do you show in the intended way, you could have saved your time at all.
Did you have extensive rehearsal before the gigs?
ASP: Yes, in the beginning we have practised a lot. The reason was, that we did two things with the rehearsals: We had band practice as well as vocal practice. Due to the four voices that I had recorded for the album, we had to try and practice a lot to make it sound well in the live setting. We could have played that from the playback, of course, but we did not want that. And it has been better that way. I sometimes feel bad that we do not have so much time for vocal practice anymore.
Lets go back to your first major live-gig: The beautiful Wasserburg Geretzhoven. What are your memories on that event?
ASP: The festival was organised by the former internet magazine „Gothic World“. We had been lucky that the boss of that magazine liked us from the very beginning. So he offered us to play there. We have been pretty much surprised as we initally did not plan to play live at all. This was caused by the experiences we had made by playing in other bands before ASP. Live-Business had been awful back then and we did not want to get into that again. Strange enough it took us only 10 minutes to decide that we will do it. The feeling of being on stage is not comparable with anything else. To experience it, you can cope with a lot of things.
The gig took place in a barn at full daylight. That is the most unhappy situation for a band, especially when the sun is shining straight into your face.
How did it come that you get signed to Trisol?
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ASP: Against all odds and traditions, we have started to work in the internet as the major medium from the very beginning. Our website had been very good and expressive. We still try to do that today as well, but due to the many other websites, this is not as easy as it used to be. Back then it seemed to be impressive enough though, that Alex Storm got in touch with us.
Compared to the projects we had started during the 10 years before ASP, it was very easy to get that signing. Obviously the project worked out with that ideas and music.
2
001 you have released „:Duett – der Schwarze Schmetterling Teil 2“.
What differences have you noticed in regards of working with a label?
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ASP:Â Initially we found it all very tricky and complicated. There are a lot of approaches that we had neglected with our debut. The label wanted to use the success of the debut to push a second album soon afterwards. That decision has turned out to be a pitfall that we did not want to repeat again. I think you can hear that it has been written very spontanuously. On the other hand it has much more of a concept that the first album.
When do you think did you have your major breakthrough?
ASP:Â The answer for that is normally intuition...I think it still has to come. You could say, the debut has been the breakthrough, since releasing an album is always a breakthrough. But I think I would say: Success is hard to quantify. I know many people think we have achieved everything one could dream of, because we have such a hugh success in the dark scene. But we are far away from owning houses or driving big cars. We put all money into our music and the releases. So it is hard to answer the question. We are far away from the imagination of the people out htere. I know that there are many people out there that still need to discover ASP. I am always happy about people who learn that rockmusic can have a deeper message and like it. There is so much of potential and many people we have yet to reach. Maybe then we have achieved in breaking through...
And what kind of bands have been your idols?
ASP: Sisters Of Mercy. To learn about them for me was the first step into the dark scene. When I was listening to them the first time, I instantly wanted to have all from them and want to know everything. It had been a very crucial event in my life. There are also other bands that I like to listen to, from very different styles. Typo O’Negative as another example of a band that has changed me inside. Music that becomes so essential to people’s mind, never looses ist value.
During the past years, ASP has grown more and more. How did you feel the ascension of the band?
ASP:Â Lots of work. Nothing of the thing we have achieved yet, has been given to us at ease. We always had to struggle and fight for it. But we always wanted to be fair, that is very important to us. We have tried to keep the track and not getting swallowed by others, but it has been very exhausting. With some delay, we notice it now. We are honestly as very hard-working band. That we keep up with the work without loosing our family is very hard and demanding for us. We have to invest much time in the approaches to be use and be careful each day. But I think we got rewarded for not having given up our ideals.
Okay, so far about the history of ASP. We are not here and now, and you celebrate your 10th anniversary. What does it mean to you?
ASP: We try to celebrate it with many small parties with the people that have followed us during the past 10 years. There will be no big fest. We rather invest the money in some cool stuff for our fans. E.g. there is a history at our website, we you can read everything month by month. For each year, there is a special offer, too. Ten years is an unbelieveable long time. According to a statistics, 95% of the bands don’t survive the third year. So this anniversary is a reason to celebrate, of course, but also a reason to reflect. We will also celebrate it live on the gigs of the year. The contact to the fans has always been very important for us. But I guess this is something you can’t do each year, as this is very stressing. But it had been unbelievable nice. We have been headlining a lot and could perform whatever we wanted. We have a great team. All of that leaves a very good feeling about it. Despite of the rising amount of critics we get back so much from the fans, that we feel rewarded and honoured.
On 2nd October your new double-single „Wer Sonst?/Im Märchenland“ will be released. How long did you work on that?
ASP: Hard to say. You can never say when the idea came up. After the last tour we had quickly started working on the DVD and BlueRay, and the 3-CD Album of the tour. Although he had professionals around us, we realised that we would not finish the work and it remained unclear if there would be any new material from us this year. But sometimes a song just needs to be unleashed. When you have an idea, you can’t stop it. We just decided at one point to release the double-single instead of the album...
What is the difference between the standard and deluxe-version?
ASP:Â Both versions contain the same audio material. But I wanted to add something to the limited edition. So I decided to have the 30pages comic in a 42-paged book.
Can you get the comic somewhere else, too. Are there more comics planned?
ASP: We try to get as many copies for ous shop as possible. Both editions can be purchased at our shop, of course. If everything goes well, further comics will be planned. The work of this single is called „Johann Salamander and the Case of Alice“. I want to work with different paintes for each book now. My focus is of course on ASP, but I want to develop and independent directions, too.
The original scripts has been written by you, the final drawings were done by Ingo Römling. What did you feel when you saw the comic for the first time?
ASP:Â I was overwhelmed. I know it is very hard to do such work in a short time and I was really excited about the first sketches. The colours are brilliant, the characters perfect. I am very proud of the final result and I am looking forward to the reactions about it
How many comics have been written by ASP so far?
ASP: Hard to say. During the 90s I have released several books of comics with a painter at a publisher called „Comic Plus“ and one album at „Carlsen Comics“. Then I haven’t released something for a long time, but I never stopped to draw scenarios. I have worked with Ingo Römling on a vampire comic that has never been finished due to various reasons. For 2 years I have been working on a funny comic-series in a newspaper-strip style. Maybe there will be a book at the end, but this is uncertain at the moment.
Do you reckon comics to be art or „lunch break literature“?
ASP: Thats like asking if popmusic is commerce. There are different stages of both I guess. By definition, comics are art. It’s a pity that Germany is so much behind the others regarding comic culture and ist still about to discover it now.
Ok, let’s talk about the tracklist. There are some famous artists like In Extremo, Clan of Xymox of Project Pitchfork that have given your songs a very special touch in their remixes. What can you tell us about them?
ASP: The two remixes of Clan of Xymox and Project Pitchfork happened due to our dear label. I was really happy to learn that there are other good bands on our label, too, when alex suggested these two to do remixes. Micha of In Extremo and me have been friends for quite a while now. His attitude and the climate of cooperation I really appreciate, so that i wanted to ask him to sing with me on „Zaubererbruder“. But it did not work out due to our commitments. Thus I asked him again. He was excited and it became a very nice cooperation. A really great experience for me.
With Zaubererbruder you have had Eric Fish as guest musician. Has he been a substitute for Micha back then?
ASP: No, he wasn’t. Eric has been part of it much earlier. We have recorded the song already in 2006. Initially, the storyboard was not really clear, the cast had been set wrong, so we needed to rerecord the song. But from the very beginning I knew, that I wanted to have Eric on board again.
There are also two coversongs. What fascinates you on Trio and The Cult that you wanted to dedicate two songs to them?
ASP: The Cult is clearly one pioneer band of the entire music style that I have listened to throughout the years. That has been exactly the song I always tried to work on ever since. Normally I don’t like cover songs as they normally do not fit to our concept. Thus, it is not easy to integrate them. But they fit the single. It has been very demanding to work on it and it is hard to add something to such perfect songs.
The Trio-Song has been circulating among us for years as a running gag. Whenever something went wrong, somebody says: „Kummer!“. We basically had no way around covering it. But we made something else out of it than Trio. I don’t know whether we made it perfect, but at least we managed to make it so dark and sad, that nobody can deny that we are a gothband!
And, there is a video on the double-feature single. The song „Wer sonst?“ has been recorded at the Blackfield-Festival this year, where you already performed it. How did the crowd react?
ASP: I had the feeling, that the people at the Blackfield has been very ASP-friendly in general. For us it has been a beautiful festival and a great unforgettable event. I was wondering if the song has been known to the audience when we performed it, as people behaved like they knew the song for years. They even joined in the chorus and had party to it. The song is very emotional for me and i was very anxious to perform it first time live on stage. But this was gone immediately by the enthusiasm of the people. This premier had been an exciting thing for us.
Another question about the forthcoming release: There is the claim „Rückgrat zeigen“ („be yourself“) on the cover. What is the link between this saying and the single „Wer sonst?“?
ASP: There are many ways of interpretation that I do not want to unveil. „Wer sonst?“ is clearly a song with a social-critical message. Due to the stories we as band had to go through and in general, i have wondered more than once if this work will pay out at the end of the day. „Wer sonst?“ gives a positive answer. It’s always worth to do something, to change the world at least a tiny bit. You can only achieve that when you are yourself and oppose the mentality of „panem et circenses“ in our today’s society.
Simultanuously to the release there will be a bigger tour. I am now interested what we can expect to experience on the clubtour?
ASP: Bascially the same as always: We will give our best and we have nice people touring with us that will ensure that the entire evening will be a perfect experience. But also there will be a lot of new songs. We will play songs from the single, but also from the forthcoming „Zaubererbruder“-Album. And we never did a real rocktour. So we will perform some songs for the first time or there will be alternative versions of them. I think it will be a good mixture of unusual and hits everybody can enjoy.
Will there be an unplugged concert sometimes in the future?
ASP: That’s for sure for 100%. I can’t reveal any details now are it is all not really fixed. The tour is now main priority. But we have planned it.
There is a major tour planned for Germany, Austria and Switzerland. Are there any plans for playing in other countries?
ASP: No. We have tried to play in foreign countries for years, but there was not much resonance. German-spoken music is very trendy at the moment, but the venues are very reserved as they want to have full house always. And that is something we won’t achieve abroad. And by the way, we do not have the money for it at the moment.
During the past years you have played more and more metal festivals, too. How did this come and what are the feedbacks you got there?Â
ASP: We always wanted to play festivals without the restrictions of a scene. Some find is embarrissing that on a metal festival guys like ASP apprear. But we also know how to rock and most of the people forget their sceptic opinion when they see and hear what we are doing. We had really nice and impressive events, like Wacken. Or the this year’s Deichbrand-Festival, where I guess maybe 8 people knew us, but 8000 did party with us – it has been hilarious.
While speaking about live performances. You have played the Leipzig Wave-Gothic Meeting of this year 2009. After that, you have written a open letter to the organisers regarding the Nazi-Symbols used on the camping tickets. Did the problem solve at all and will there be another ASP-gig there in Leipzig in the future?
ASP: No, nothing has been solved or clarified until today. It’s obvious for us that the people won’t see us there play. We have tried to achieve a sufficient result. Parts of that company have been open for dialog but they did not answer our questions sufficiently so far. We do not want to perform at a festival that uses such kind of symbols intentionally with that purpose.
Who inspires you to write the lyrics and the songs for ASP?
ASP: That question also causes problems for me to answer, as you want to get a precise answer I simply cannot give. I am inspired by all around me, but maybe most of all a simple plain white paper. I can’t cope with ist emptiness, it needs to be filled.
Our fan-question is about the song „Ich will brennen“ (I want to burn). The song itself is a statement against the planned reformation of the copyrights in Germany with prohibition of the private copy. Did that background of the song have any impact with your fans? The song itself has been a floorfiller for a long time, but maybe the message got lost on the way?
ASP: I think it is totally okay to enjoy a song and dance to it. I have not written the song only due to the renovation of the copyright laws., but also due to personal experience. Afterwards the song fit that topic perfectly. People really like the song and may got the message – but many simply don’t know the difference between a security copy and an illegal copy. We did not want to express that with this song, we just wanted to draw attention to the discussion, that there IS a difference. People how copy their bought material are of course no criminals!
Every band mourns about illegal downloads and internet. But despite of the situation, you produce high-quality digipaks and limited editions in books. Does this policy pay off??
ASP: First of all it is nice when the creative attitude and expectations of label and band go well together. This positive development has to be acknoledged. The fans get additional value and many appreciate the creative work in it. In stores it is hard to find limited editions. Mostly due to the unusual format they don’t fit the size of the normal shelfs. Thats’s something that helps the independent mailorders. The calculation does not pay off, however. We invest more into the high-quality artwork than we can make money of it. But you need trust and faith into the project. But I doubt that we can stop the trend of downloads by that. Maybe we can maintain the haptic experience of buying a great CD for such a long time until a new model of distribution has been found. Many people say they prefer the download as music is the most important part. The entire experience to flip through a beautiful booklet while listening to the music and to have an artwork accompanying the music is something you can’t download.
The cycle of the Krabat-Songs has been ended now. What phantastic fairytale-land will you highjack us now to?
ASP: Well, for now there is still the single. There are some hints on it, but I do not want to disclose any direction. I just want to say one thing: It will get dark. I want to see the next album to contain all the things we have achieved over the past 10 years. The next album ought to be the best album of all times. The setting of the imaginary world we want the listener to explore only after unpacking and while listening, not before.
What does Butterflies mean to your life or to the band, as they accompany you from the very beginning („Der Schwarze Schmetterling“ = „The Black Butterfly“)?
ASP:Â The association you get when observing a butterfly is lightness that I long to have for myself. On the other hand it is the chance for metamorphosis. This picture of a change is very emotionally powerful for me and is a source of hope for me, too. You change yourself many times during life. There is no end, but always a chance for a change.
Many thanks for the interview and your time. We wish you much fun while on tour and also great success with your new release „Wer sonst? / Im Märchenwald“. Do you have some closing remarks or a final word for the fans out there?
ASP:Â Be yourself!
Interview conducted by Lucy @ Promofabrik.
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