Ted Poley Interview

I first met Ted Poley back in 1989. Danger Danger was opening for Lita Ford in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. I was a college student, and a couple of buddies and I drove up to see the show. Danger Danger put on a great show and the crowd was really into it. Lita Ford wasn't so good that night. In fact, she was so bad we left about halfway through her set. We went back behind the venue and the Danger Danger guys were hanging out by their bus. We talked to them for quite a while, and they were very cool and friendly. Ted was especially nice and took the time to chat with us. It was good to speak to him again after all these years.

Poley got his start in music as the drummer for the New Jersey group Prophet. After recording an album with them and demoing the second (which including their single "Sound Of A Breaking Heart"), Poley was asked by Bruno Ravel to record vocals on a demo for a group he was putting together. That group was Danger Danger, and Poley left Prophet to be the lead singer of the new band. They released their self-titled debut in 1989, which contained the singles "Bang Bang" and "Naughty Naughty". Their 1991 follow-up, Screw It, didn't do as well on the charts. After the 1993 recording of their third album, Cockroach, Poley was fired from Danger Danger. A lengthy legal battle ensued, and the album was finally released in 2002.

After leaving Danger Danger, Poley formed Bone Machine. They released three albums, the last one in 1996. Poley also sang on the video game "Sonic the Hedgehog" and "Sonic 2". He then formed the band Melodica with Gerhard Pichler in 2000. They released three CDs under that name, and the same group released Big as Poley/Pichler in 2002. Pichler has left the group to return to his native Austria, and has been replaced by Steve Massa. That group plays live dates on the East Coast, and have recently played with Firehouse, Quiet Riot, and Vince Neil. They also play clubs doing cover tunes under the moniker Out of Danger. Here's my conversation with the entertaining and always honest Ted Poley:

Chad Bowar: Talk about your latest project, Out of Danger.

Ted Poley: I play a lot of national type gigs where I do a lot of the Danger Danger stuff from the old days and all the things from my projects over the years. I've been in the business for about 25 years now. I have a great band that when we are not doing the national gigs we do cover songs. It's just a club band that goes out and plays our favorite songs. We do everything from Whitesnake to Van Halen to Bon Jovi. My keyboard player is female and a great singer, so we do Heart, Vixen, Pat Benatar and all sorts of really rockin stuff. It's a lot of fun. I have a great band and we love playing, so it fills in the dates in between the national things.

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