After talking to a highly spirited Ted Poley back in December I could understand why he named his latest release ‘Smile'. I was continuously picturing his face with a big smile as he kept making funny comments and laughing. A happy person indeed, which is not surprising given the very busy 2007 he has had and the equally busy year ahead where a long awaited Danger Danger studio album as well as his CD with Vic Rivera will be hopefully completed. First of all, congratulations on the your new album ‘Smile'. After the release of your successful first solo album ‘Collateral Damage' you said that it was your best sounding release since Danger Danger. In your eyes how does ‘Smile' compare?

It doesn't sound exactly the same. However in its own way I think it's of equal quality and it certainly has broken all my own sales records. It's sold out on my own site www.tedpoley.com. You have to go to someone else's site if you want it. So next time I tell you to pre-order something out there, pre-order it! Coming soon Poley/Rivera, so get your pre-orders soon. ‘Smile' did amazing. As far as sound they're both really high quality CDs, both world class recordings but they don't sound exactly the same, which is what I want. I don't want exactly the same thing every time but I do want the same level of quality every time. So I have to say some people prefer ‘Collateral Damage', some prefer ‘Smile' but they all have had positive comments to say about both.

Are you going to have any more copies available on your website?

‘Smile' is actually sold out [on my website]. It's so expensive for me to bring them in to sell on my own site, because the dollar is very low now and I have to pay for the shipping from Italy, as it's on Frontiers. Some of my CDs are on my own label so it's a little easier to sell them directly. But with things like this I did the pre-orders for the fans so they could have autographed copies because I like to have direct contact with fans and they love to have autographed copies, so I always would do pre-orders for every one of my releases. I hope they can get it through all of the other mailers. It's totally available. It's only sold out on my site. However once again I think it's a good marketing strategy because the next time I'll tell them to pre-order something then they'll guarantee to come. Like I said, Poley/Rivera will be coming soon so I suggest you pre-order it because I will sell it out, I swear, haha!

You posted on your website about your discomfort with someone else, i.e. Lilly Allen, using that album title.

Well, there's actually a few more people that even use it. I just thought it reflected my attitude at the time and now as well. I'm pretty happy over this past year, so it doesn't really have anything to do with anybody else. I don't care. How many people have songs of the same title? It's all different anyway. There's only so many titles, but I was a little disappointed that I thought of the idea and then in between the time that I thought of it and the time my CD came out Lilly Allen released her version [laughs]. I'm not copying anybody. It's just my own attitude of today.

On your website you said you wanted to gather as many pictures of smiles of your fans as you could for the cover.

What I really wanted to do was just have all sorts of different smiles or similar shapes on little squares but then the record company wanted to handle all of the artwork. They loved the CD, I was very happy about that so I really didn't hassle them when they wanted to go with their own art department. Since they liked the music I thought ‘Well, that was the hard part. Let them package it the way they like to'. So they had their own concept and that pretty much threw mine into the recycle bin. But that's okay, I was very happy with the outcome. It's a cool cover, some nice art, and Frontiers knows best because the CD is doing very, very well and I would hate to think that I'd put the other cover on it and it wouldn't have sold. I give that one to Frontiers.

On ‘Collateral Damage' Vic Rivera did most of the writing but on the new release he just plays guitar on a couple of songs and you are releasing an album with him, Poley/Rivera. Tell us about this release and about the writing on ‘Smile'.

My musical partnership with Vic goes back to the ‘Collateral Damage' CD, which he wrote most of and some of the best songs, as well as he played everything except for a few guest lead guitar parts which were played by Andy Timmons, Pete Lesperance, Bill Leverty and so many other great guys. Vic and I have been working on the Poley/Rivera CD which is our personal project. That's been taking a little while ... we're perfecting it, so it's taking a long time and we won't release it before it's ready. But in the meantime I got the offer from Frontiers to do the solo record, which was ‘Smile' and actually the title track was written by Vic since I always involve him in a little bit of everything I do. And since he's so busy with Poley/Rivera I still wanted him to write a few songs for ‘Smile' and he came up with the title track ‘Smile' and with another song called ‘Will Ya', which is a really cool song. If you listen to both of those it's very obvious that it has Vic's writing style and since he wrote them I asked him to play the guitars on those tracks. JK Northrup actually plays the guitars on the whole record except for just the songs that Vic wrote, where I had Vic do his own leads as a thank you for writing the song. So there is a little bit of Vic in everything I do [laughs]. He's a great guy and my great friend and we'll do some other work on the side, but the Poley/Rivera thing is something I'm very excited about and I think people are going to love that. It's back to a little bit heavier sound like ‘Collateral Damage', maybe even slightly heavier, but yet totally melodic. He's a great song writer and together we write a lot of great hooks, so I'm really looking forward to it, so as soon as you can pre-order it don't get left out of this one!

When can we expect a release?

I'm looking for a late spring release, probably early summer, maybe taking pre-orders sort of spring time so we can help pay for the pressing. We are going to release it ourselves, that's why it stalled a little bit. We had some really long negotiations going on with a record label which I won't name but it was a very frustrating experience and it stalled us about two months. I am very upset about it because in the end they didn't come through with their promises. But I won't mention who they are, I am just glad to have escaped from that deal [laughs].

How come the new album with Rivera doesn't come out with Frontiers and you have two albums released a few months apart?

The Poley/Rivera record was actually already in the making before ‘Smile', except that I work quicker than Vic and I can work together because he has a full-time day job and I'm always doing other things with Danger Danger or I'm out on the road touring solo. So the Poley/Rivera record will take longer. But with ‘Smile' I had a dedicated team of JK Northrup, Dan Zoid and Eric Ragno so we were making a record simultaneously and we just got that done quicker because we had a deadline for Frontiers that was signed already and that was the job. We wanted to do a good job for Frontiers and get it on time, we did, they released it, they did a wonderful job recording it and it's been great for me. But otherwise the Poley/Rivera CD is always on the works and I still have another song to sing on it. It will be done.

Aside from the two songs that Vic wrote, who did the writing for the other songs on ‘Smile'?

The Martin brothers, who are wonderful writers. They do a lot of work for Frontiers on other CDs and they're friends of mine. They wrote some, I wrote some with them. I pretty much wrote a little bit with everybody who wrote on the record. I wrote a part of each song. Otherwise, there's my friend Joey D., who provided a song called ‘Maybe' for ‘Collateral Damage' and I always like to have a few of his songs on my records because he's a great friend and a great song writer. So he did a bunch of writing for this one and I pretty much helped everybody out a little bit and added my little bit. I'm doing more and more writing these days. I'm very very happy with the songs. There's something on it for everybody. Even with Poley/Rivera I'll still continue to put out separate solo CDs as well. Actually, I've been having some luck touring as a solo artist lately and Danger Danger was in Germany recently at the United Forces of Rock, but a month before I did a killer tour of Brazil, a few cities there and it was all sold out. So I went back to Rio after Germany with Firehouse.

Lots of people seem to be going lately to Brazil and have a wonderful experience. Tell us about that.

The fans are just amazing. They love to rock. It's a fun place to play because I love the food, the weather and the people. They are really a lot of fun. You get great crowds. There's so much of a rock scene I hadn't realised until I went personally myself and the scene was so great that I sold everything out, sold out every show and they had me come back three months later. I'll be going back again I believe in May. Down there it's more of a solo career. I've developed my solo shows so that I can get quite a good crowd and we've done some great shows down there, a lot of press, television and a lot of things that I've built up. So now I'm looking forward to going back in May. I'll be doing lots of Danger Danger work in between.

Good news about Danger Danger. You are releasing a new album!

Yes, we are. It's a top secret project and all I can tell you is that the CD will be round and plastic. That's the most information I can give you because if I say anything else they'll kill me or even worse fire me again [laughs]. I can't help you there. But I can guarantee you that it will not be an experimental modern record. There may be a song or two that it's modern sounding because it's a different time but we are not going to stray from the classic Danger Danger formula too far. I think from what I heard it'll be a fan pleasing record. We're working on it. These guys are perfectionists so until it's absolutely perfect they won't release it. So I never get too set on any deadlines because we tend to revise deadlines a lot in Danger and Danger. However, yes, there will be a new CD that everyone can look forward to, including myself, and other than that it's all top secret that even I am unaware of most of the details at this point [laughs]. I can't possibly estimate when, but I can tell you definitely it's coming. The only thing this year that might stall it a little bit is we want to play a little bit more live. We've been doing more high profile festivals and if we get some shows that takes a little bit away from recording. I believe the record is mostly written and I should be starting to sing in it any year now [laughs]. [Note: Bruno told me at UFoR in Germany that the new album would be 75% classic D2 sound, and 25% a more modern sound - Ed]

It will be the definitive line-up, albeit without Andy Timmons. Who is replacing him and how did you guys get together for this?

Kasey [Smith] is unfortunately not playing either. He hasn't been in the band since I've been back. He was out a long time ago. He's on with his life and very happy, I'm sure. Andy Timmons no longer plays in the band, although he did do a solo on the song that he wrote on ‘Collateral Damage', which was very nice of him, on. But as far as Danger Danger goes, we have Robert Marcello who is a great guitar player, grew up on Andy Timmons and Danger Danger is his favourite band. The guy is amazing. Live it's a great show. You know, we miss Andy but you won't [laughs]. Rob does a great job. It's not slagging Andy. You know what I mean, we miss him as a brother, we wish he was there but since he's not, believe me, the show doesn't suffer because Rob is playing guitar. Trust me, he's great.

Who is filling in for Kasey?

We have our secret keyboard player who is invisible. Sometimes you hear keyboards but you don't see the keyboard player [laughs].

You were saying you went with D2 to Germany in September to play the United Forces of Rock gig. You hadn't rehearsed or seen the guys for two years.

That's fairly standard with Danger Danger. Most bands do three days on, two days off. We do like a day on and 400 days off, 2 days on, 600 days off, so I'm sort of used to it. But I stay in shape all the time, I work out to the music and I'm always doing my solo shows in the meantime. So I'm always in shape and ready to do a show and wherever they call me to do a D2 show, since we're not really physically located that closely, they rehearse and they do a great job and I rehearse on my own and pretty much we are very professional and we've been singing these songs for twenty years now. Live we would never really had to rehearse, the natural showmanship just comes out anyway and still does with everybody. We're a fun band, we don't take ourselves too seriously live. We have a great time, the audience has a great time because we are having a great time and I think it keeps it interesting quite honestly.

I would imagine when the new D2 album comes out you will be wanting to tour Europe.

Oh, yes, whether it comes out or not, because if the album is late we'd still play Europe if we have the dates planned. But absolutely we will be touring more in support of the new CD. That will bring some new excitement too because then we get to play some brand new songs. I haven't really sang anything new by Danger Danger in maybe 15 years now, so I'm looking forward to having a couple of new really cool songs to play live. I'm sure they'll be a lot of fun and yes, we will tour more in support of the CD because that will renew our excitement in having something new to say. So we will of course tour Europe because we always do love Europe, we do very well there. I want to bring them to Brazil with me next time, that's for sure. And hopefully we'll do a few of these newer festivals that are popping up in the United States, like Rocklahoma. I know we have been offered these things but it's just a matter of whether we are going to be recording or be able to play. More touring for sure, so please keep an eye out. Danger Danger will be back out on the road and do come see us whilst we are out there, because you know we go on hibernation for another two years. You'll catch my show, I never go into hibernation, but those guys do some serious hibernating!

I guess there are no fixed dates yet...

Actually, we do have a few shows and, would you believe it? It's top secret right now so I can't tell you anything about them [laughs]! But yes, we actually have a few high visibility festivals we're working on.

But that doesn't help fans to try and get there...

No, believe me, the fans will know. It's just that I hate promoting things that are sort of in negotiation in case they don't happen. I don't want to confuse the fans anymore than I already have, let's say [laughs].

You've been very very busy this year. What other projects have you been involved lately aside from your solo, the Poley/Rivera and Danger Danger CDs?

You know what? I go on vacation to Jamaica the day after tomorrow and I'll just lie on the beach with my wife and do nothing for a week. It's the one week of the year that I go away and this year I won't feel guilty at all, I'll just forget everything for one week. Usually I feel guilty, but this year I think I'm going to feel like I deserve it. Last year at this time I remember I was reviewing the Frontiers contract to do the ‘Smile' CD but I had just come off the recording and the promotion of ‘Collateral Damage'. I was simultaneously doing a CD called ‘The Pleasure Dome', which is on another label which I won't mention and probably won't be promoting, but it's kind of a cool CD. I'm not involved in that one anymore, I'm kind of pissed off at that label right now so I'm not going to mention any more than that. Then I did one song for The Liberty and Justice stuff, which is always a nice compilation of a lot of cool singers and I'm doing some faith base rock. Then I did three songs for a Japanese guitar player called Takayoshi Omura. Obviously all of these things involve demos and of course the studio works, so everything I say is twice as much as it sounds like. And then, believe it or not, I worked on another Sega video game theme for ‘Sonic The Hedgehog' and probably some other things I can't even think about right now. It's been almost every day in the studio or doing something. I think I'm just getting tired of thinking about what I've done last year [laughs]. I think I've done about five CDs, don't forget in the meantime I was working on Poley/Rivera and commuting back and forth from California to the East Coast, 3,000 miles to work JK Northrup for ‘Smile', which was worth every mile. However it was a bit of a commute. So wow, you know what? I feel even better about leaving to my vacation. I'm going to get off the phone right now and pack [laughs].

Ok, I'll let you go in a minute!

No, that's okay! I didn't mean to cut it short. I'm in a good mood this year, but I'm in a stupid good mood today because this is probably my last piece of ‘call it work' for my year.

And 2008 is going to be busy as well.

Oh yeah. Between the Danger Danger recording and the live dates. Once again I'll be touring solo hopefully. I know in Brazil and wherever else I can get a solo show and maybe of course working with other people and shovelling people's driveways if it snows and it pays. Whatever. I'll be pumping gas, washing windows, whatever I can do. I'm constantly working all day at something. Every day I have to wake up and think what exactly. It's either a concert for a thousand people or do I try to get a job pumping gas? I never know. I go from one extreme to the other, but it keeps it interesting.

That covers all my questions, so anything you want to add now it's your opportunity.

I love when people visit www.tedpoley.com and I want to thank everybody for a fantastic year and a really interesting career up to this point and for enabling me to continue the party. I'm still getting up there at this age [laughs] and we're still rocking like crazy and I want to see every body on the road either at a solo show or a D2 show, it doesn't matter, we always come and hang out. We're very interactive with the fans, so looking forward to seeing everybody. I wish them a happy holiday but by the time this article already comes out I hope you all already had a happy holiday, a very Merry Christmas, happy Hanukah and happy Kwanzaa.