The noble art of Potential Threat SF

(photo: Alina Michelle)

Hailing from the San Francisco Bay Area, Potential Threat SF carries on the long-standing tradition of Thrash Metal in the very same region in which it was born. Formed in 2001, their influences range from New York Hardcore such as Sick Of It All and The Cro-Mags to the aggressive music styles of Slayer and Metallica. Their drive to work hard promoting the band while making the necessary sacrifices in order to put them in a position to tour extensively in and out of the country. And after I met them in Eindhoven on their European tour I send a couple of questions to Mike and Kenny. So enjoy the conversation with the two brothers.

Please give us a short introduction of yourself?
This is Mike and Kenny from Potential Threat SF. Kenny plays drums and Mike plays guitar and does lead vocals. We've been around since the Beatles! (no, really!)

Introduce the other 2 members and tell something we shouldn't know about them?
Kenny: The only other member we have in the band is Damien Sisson, who plays bass for us - the D-Man. He's also in Death Angel and Points North and he DEFINITELY doesn't want you to know about that! HAHAHA

So how noble are you?
Mike: Very noble, oh so very noble. Nobler than the most noble of nobles!
Kenny: Did he mention we ARE noble??? HAHAHA

How is it to play with your brother in the band?
Mike: Just terrible, you have no idea!
Kenny: Nice guy, after all I taught him, huh?
Mike: To be serious, though, to me - bands with brothers have been the best… there's always something unique about them. Pantera, Van Halen, etc., they all have a tightness in the music that non-related band members don't get very often.
Kenny: It's all about being on the same page as each other. Since Mike is the singer and we write all the music together, Mike knows what he can sing to and what he can't. We compliment each other with how we write and play since we know what each other is going to do.

How did you grew up together?
Mike: We both had the same interests in music from the beginning. We've always been outcasts a bit, so you sort of gravitate toward that type of music.
Kenny: Growing up and listening to KISS was just not acceptable back then, especially in a Christian family. Anything that was not acceptable was just cool, especially when we were both shitty in school.

One dragged the other into metal?
Mike: We also have an older brother, David, who got into thrash metal before we did. He saw Metallica at Ruthie's when there was only 5 people in the crowd. That's why I'm such a James Hetfield rip-off to this day. HAHAHA But seriously, when everyone was all into Van Halen and Y&T, that's the heaviest music anyone had heard. Then suddenly we heard Metallica and it's was such a different pace and so crazy that we couldn't keep up at first or understand all of it with it's fastness, but then you get used to it and get into it and then that's all you wanted to hear after that.
Kenny: When AC/DC was the heaviest thing back then, that tone just hurt your ears. But, when you compared that to other music on the radio, it was way heavy, so that's what we liked. Back in Black was hella heavy when it came out… not to date myself or anything. We bought it the day it came out, AND on vinyl! I tended to like Slayer a bit more, which was WAY too fast, but that got me into Exodus and S.O.D., both of which had incredible drummers.

Was there a kind of competition about knowing bands or collecting albums?
Kenny: No, we each had our own stuff. I would buy a certain band, then Mike would buy a certain band, then David would buy a certain band. None of us bought the same bands so that way we had all the bands covered between us.
Mike: I personally handled the Aersomith and Van Halen department, Kenny handled the Cheap Trick and Scorpions department, and then David handled the Black Sabbath, AC/DC and Ted Nugent department.
Kenny: By the time Iron Maiden came around, it was ever brother for himself. We all had started driving by then, so we all wanted a copy of a cassette to blast in the car.

You formed the band and did you had goals in mind to reach? Something like a business plan? And did you reach any of them plans?
Kenny: No business plan really… that's for managers to worry about. But all mangers generally want is money and the reason I want to save the money instead was to be able to put it back into the band itself, so we did everything mostly on our own.
Mike: There were always certain clubs I wanted to play, right away when we started, that were too big for us. But eventually, we did get to play those types of clubs, so were able to reach that goal. But once you've played those places, which was great, but it makes you keep going and wanting to play other clubs and bigger places.
Kenny: Touring and recording, those have always been goals for us, and we've reached those goals a few times. That doesn't mean that we stop with those goals… it's a goal we put out there for ourselves all the time. If those goals weren't there, then there's no need for us to play music.

Recently released the debut "A New Threat Level" and what was the progress compared to the demos and EP?
Kenny: With demos and EPs, you don't want to put too much money into them because you only have a little bit of time to get in there, record, mix, and get out. So in that respect, we don't spend quite as much time on them… not like you would on a full-length album. When we recorded "A New Threat Level", we took quite a bit of time writing, demoing, rehearsing, and recording the album because we wanted it to sound more professional, like an album should sound.
Mike: The 2.0 EP was actually recorded with the same producer as the new album, so recording went by faster since he already knew what we sound like and what to expect. It made things go a lot smoother. People who already have the 2.0 EP know a bit more about the new album than people that haven't heard it, because the new album includes re-recorded versions of most of the songs on that EP. There's only one song on that EP that we didn't record for the new album.

The potential of the album lead to the EU tour with Master. Who got you involved in this tour? Were you asked or had to buy in?
Kenny: Our label's booking agency got us onto both parts of the European tour with Master. A lot of bands on any given label in general aren't able to tour as much as most labels would want, and we wanted to be able to do that for ours since they gave us support in releasing the album in the first place. All we want to do is to get out there and if that means we have to put our own money into it, then that's what we will do. We all have day jobs and we save the money to get out there because we live for the day and try not to live life like everyone else thinks we should. All I want to do is play music. Is that so wrong?

The tour is over now and how do you look back to it? What were the pros and cons?
Mike: Touring is always going to be a bit of a pain, I mean, there's always issues of privacy and stuff like that, but I love touring. Playing in city after city is really cool and being on stage is what it's always about. Of course things wear thin near the end of a month-long tour, but when you look back on it, especially the videos and pictures we took, it makes me want to be back out there again.
Kenny: It's kind of a love-hate thing… there's more love than hate, but the days off are the worst. What do you do? You're in a routine of loading gear, setting up, warming up, playing, loading out… when you have a day off, it's like you're in limbo, especially if it's actually a "driving-to-the-next-gig" day. There's only so much you can do on a bus. I'd rather be playing every single night. You find yourself doing the stupidest things just to keep yourself from going insane from boredom.

And how was it to tour with Paul? Can he be considered as a mentor? He is somewhat the dad of death metal. Did he learned you some tricks?
Mike: Paul has a good way of expressing himself and really professional, no matter what is going on. He knows what he wants and he is very personable, so it's a good combination. He's exactly how I expected him to be - super nice and determined at everything he does.
Kenny: He always knows what he wants and will do whatever he can to achieve that, so we all got along really well right away. He's been around in the industry a long time and he's even writing a book now! He has a lot to say plus a lot of experience and I think most of the young kids in bands now would learn a lot from him.

And how was the atmosphere among the other bands? Did you know them before?
Kenny: We started out with only four bands (for the first half of the tour), so that was cool. Destroy the Opposition were a lot of fun to hang out with… just nice guys. I really like them because they are so young and don't care if they are look cool on stage and all that kind of stuff - they just get up there and play. Then for the second half of the tour, we had one band going back home (Destroy the Opposition) and three bands coming onto the tour, so it was a lot more chaotic at first since there were so many bands. The Whorrid guys were good people, too, because I kind of knew them already since our manager Alina talked to them a LOT before they got out here… she was trying to help them before they came out to the tour. So they already knew us by name and everything when they first arrived, which was pretty cool. We generally got along with everyone on the whole tour.
Mike: We didn't know any of the bands prior to the booking of the tour (which then we of course went to the myspace pages to take a listen). We were out with Sacrificial Slaughter and Master for the entire month of the tour, so we really got to know each other and help each other out after a while. Shank from Sacrificial Slaughter was really cool - he always videotaped for us, hung out with us, and even played a song with us on stage. Devar and Imbalance were nice guys, too, because they, like most European bands, were more relaxed and just going with the flow. I always tend to get along even better with guys from Europe because they are rarely really loud or obnoxious.

I saw you in Eindhoven (the Netherlands). Unfortunately few people showed up. How was it with the other gigs? What was the biggest and was Eindhoven the crappiest?
Kenny: The tour as a whole wasn't too bad. There are always nights that have less people than other nights, but regardless, we go out there and give it 110%. We play the same every night, and when we can get a crowd of people that don't know who the hell we are to sing along to a chorus of a song they don't even know, then that's what's important - to reach the people that are there.
Mike: I have to say that the Pissed to Death Festival definitely had the best vibe and response from the crowd!

There were some free days in between gigs. What did you do on those days? Sightseeing? Or went to look for some specific shops?
Kenny: Since we didn't get to exactly choose where and when we had our days off, a lot of time we were in the middle of nowhere with nothing to really look at. We did have a bit of time in Dornbirn, Austria to hang out and do a little bit of sightseeing between the rain and sun. But sometimes when we're away from everything, the only place to go is the bus - and there wasn't really a "lounge" to sit and hang out in since we had a double-decker bus.
Mike: When we got to Hamburg, we had an extra day off, which was perfect for us. We have an old friend of ours that lives there, so we got to hang out with him for quite a while and go to some cool bars, even though the Headbangers Ball club was closed that day. We didn't know that the Beat Club was actually closed down, either.

What was the overall feeling of this EU tour? Did you tape the shows for personal archives?
Kenny: Shank (from Sacrificial Slaughter) videotaped a lot of our live shows on the tour with our camera, and we did videotape a little bit while we were walking around some of the towns. I've been to a lot of places in Europe, but never got to play there, so it was nice to actually play those places. When we toured in the past, we mostly played Germany, so it was good to hit places that had a bit of a different vibe.
Mike: To sum up the tour… good times were had. I would love to get out to Europe again as soon as I can.

Is it easy to get free from work for such tours? What do yo do for a living?
Mike: I work at a hospital and clean up all the blood and whatnot off the surgical instruments after people have had surgery… how metal is that??? It can sometimes be hard to get time off, but if you have the vacation time and you give them enough notice ahead of time, it generally works out.
Kenny: I work for a medical device company, and our office is small, so it's sometimes hard to take that much time off. It takes a while to catch up when you come back, but it's worth it.

Is there a funny anecdote of the tour that wet your pants from laughing?
Mike: In Antwerp, it was raining, windy as hell, and cold, and we had to walk about 20 minutes to get back to the bus. We were bundled up and trying to keep the rain and wind out of our eyes, so we were huddled forward. We weren't exactly watching where we were going because we were just set on getting back to the bus quickly, and Kenny walked right into the bus driver's outside mirror and about knocked himself out. We were already mad about having to walk all the way back there in the cold, so that was pretty damned funny and got us in a better mood, even if Kenny had a bit of a headache.
Kenny: There were a lot of times where we saw a bunch of drunk people and stupid sound techs doing dumb stuff, but it's kind of hard to write out things like that in an interview that someone would understand and see how funny it was. It's like you have to be out there on the road and experience the funny things first-hand. Although showering in an Italian truck stop shower room isn't the most glamorous thing I've ever done. Nothing like Mike having to share a shower room with the tour manager!

What are the plans for the rest of this year? Can we expect something special?
Kenny: We've already written most of the new album and will record somewhere around the end of the year, but I hope we can get back to Europe this fall for one more short tour for the current album.

Is there something you like to say?
Mike: We would play one or two songs, and the crowd would be receptive to us. Then we would get into the 3rd song, and there would always be a bunch of metalheads at the front that would really get into the songs and start to headbang. Then we would do the 4th song and everyone would really get going, singing along with fists in the air. I would like to thank all those people that did that during our set because that really got myself and the other guys amped up, and that's a great feeling on a stage that we've never played on before. And THEN it was a REAL rock concert!

Last rites?
Kenny: If you're in a band and you want to get out on tour, there is always a way. Quit pissing around and just do it. If you want to make money, get a job. If you want to play music, play music. People get disillusioned because they see all these rich rockstars out there… it rarely works out that way. For 98% of the bands out there, making enough money on tour to live on doesn't happen, but if it's a passion, then you do it for that alone and nothing more. Music is like anything else… if there's something you want to do, then save your money and do it.