Interview: Seattle Rockers Poverty Bay on their Debut EP Release
NadaMucho.com Interview: Poverty Bay
Q&A with Greg Poppe and John Coy
Poverty Bay earned their way in to our “14 Bands to Watch in 2014” series by putting on great rock shows at some tiny clubs last year. On Wednesday, May 21 they’ll move up to the big time when they celebrate the release of their first EP, Rebel Highway, at Chop Suey alongside veteran Seattle rockers The Valley and French Letters.
NadaMucho.com: What the hell is Poverty Bay and why should anyone care?
Greg: Aaron (Danneman, the band’s drummer) grew up in Des Moines and there is a beach/bay area there called Poverty Bay. We saw it as a great opportunity to play with some topical irony and subtly address the inflated whirlpool of a monetary system that we are all stuck in and trying to get out of, which is why we designed our logo as a coin.
Poverty Bay’s Debut EP “Rebel Highway”
NM: Speaking of band names, what about “The Topical Ironies” for your next project?
Greg: A good band name is hard to come by. We’ll keep that one in mind.
NM: You’re set to release your first EP at Chop Suey May 21. What can you tell us about the record?
Johnny: It feels good to have finally gotten to this point; we’ve played a lot of shows and put in a lot of work to be here. It’s like we are completing our own college and the release is a “degree” of sorts.
NM: Cool. We are looking forward to the show. I’ve heard mentions of your “tower of power” and am excited to see it at Chop Suey on May 21. Without giving too much away, can you explain what that is?
Johnny: The tower of power is just an old trick that we’ve taken from some of our influences. Our shows are definitely about the music first, but we’ve got a couple of other tricks up our sleeve and we’re always adding new ones to keep things fresh. As to whether or not we will be doing the tower on the 21st I don’t know.
NM: What? No tower of power? Did one of you pull a muscle or something?
Greg: I guess you’ll have to come to the show to find out.
NM: Deal. You did some cool DIY YouTube videos. Tell us a little bit about those.
Greg: Thanks. We were trying to think of new ways to promote the release show, so we brainstormed some ideas for some short promo videos and asked our good friend TBASA to film them for us. He also did the artwork for our album.
NM: In general, you seem to be using social and digital media to promote your band in a really good way… a way that shows fans more of your personality and creativity. Why don’t more bands get that?
Greg: Thank you. We just try to maintain a good connection with our fans, we know a lot of them pretty well and see them when we go out to watch other bands play; Seattle is a very humble place for music. We have a lot of respect for our fans, so we see no point in putting up any walls or disguises to separate ourselves from them. Most of our local influences are on a similar page and we have really just been following their lead.
NM: Who are some of those local bands you guys respect and admire?
Johnny: That’s a long list. To name a few we’ll start with The Valley, Hobosexual, TBASA, Ever So Android, there’s a group from Reno called Failure Machine, technically they’re not local to the Northwest, but they’re definitely noteworthy. It’s really quite a privilege for us to be able to share this bill with The Valley at Chop Suey on Wednesday though.
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