Atomic Potato are a five-piece third wave ska band from Cincinnati, Ohio. They play a combination of ska, punk, and Happy Hardcore.
Bands which have been of great, or obvious, influence on Atomic Potato are The Arrogant Sons Of Bitches, Bomb the Music Industry, Streetlight Manifesto, Operation Ivy, Green Day, and The Forces of Evil.
In 2004, Robby Sager and a few friends formed a band called The Inner Darkness, which was created to bring ska, rock, emotive hardcore, and pop punk together into a BIG brassy explosion. The band had much fun, but nobody every stood up to do vocals. The band went on hiatus as the members all took different directions.
In 2007, the reformation would come from Robby Sager writing and recording songs alone, in hopes that someday other musicians will play them with him. This idea was seen being used by Jeff Rosenstock for Bomb the Music Industry, which is a big influence for Sager. A few old band mates of Sager joined and he tentative name of this project was "Robomat Jones."
Over the span of three days in August of 2007, Robby rerecorded 15 songs (every instrument performed by himself) that he had written in the past 2 years. He titled this album "The Future Isn't What It Used To Be" and burned around 80 copies. He then grabbed an acoustic guitar and left for Cleveland, Ohio to perform guerrilla style outside of the mother of all 3rd wave ska shows, Shout it Loud tour (feat. Streetlight Manifesto, Reel Big Fish and Less Than Jake) at the Agora Ballroom to a crowd of about 3. During this, he was joined by Mike Soprano of Streetlight Manifesto who jammed with him.
In October of 2007, a new line-up formed with Mitch Jones on drums, Adam Meyer on trumpet and backup vocals, Corey Montgomery from All Alliteration Aside on guitar, and Nick Shope (also from AAA) on bass. The band name The Skatomic Potato came about when the band witnessed a baked potato explode while listening to "Please Don't Bend" by Desmond Dekker. Shortly after deciding a name, Ben Vanderpool joined on trombone and trumpet. Before long, Nick and Corey left the band on good terms due to living 35 miles away from the rest of the band. Max Moon then joined on drums and Mitch Jones moved to bass. On December 14th, 2007 at The Parkland Theater in Cleveland, Ohio, Atomic Potato played their first show. The band then released the School Spirit EP and are still giving it out for free at shows.
The band then saw more lineup changes as Max Moon left unexpectedly and was replaced by Wade Knight and then Josh (or Philly). The new album, Life Is Grand EP, was released on May 11th, 2008. The album was recorded in Self-Made Studios and released on Broken Record Media (Br Prod). On the subject of pirating, Robby Sager quoted Jeff Rosenstock in saying:
"While some people who are very uncomfortable with embracing a new technology swear that this is going to kill rock and roll, I have seen first hand that it helps bands increase their audience and allows fans to discover tons of great bands. Then, usually at a show, people will buy a CD or something if the band is really good.
if you are diggin' what we're doing, please toss us some money so we can continue to grow and maybe start something new. I mean seriously, a million labels selling CDs, there's gotta be one that's giving them away, right? To download our catalog, click on the little albums link on the left and if you like an artist, please donate the suggested price. Even though we all try to record these albums on our own, your donations help us to eat on tour, pay for promotion and hopefully one day, allow us to do some cool stuff that "real" bands with "labels" do - like recording and packaging records. Fuck, with your help, maybe we can even change this stupid stupid underground music industry from fashionista indie labels back to friendly songwriters and nerds."
Members
editAtomic Potato are:
- Robby Sager: Guitars, Trumpet, Vocals
- Adam Meyer: Trumpet, Vocals
- Mitch Jones: Bass Guitar
- Ben Vanderpool: Trombone, Trumpet
- Philly: Drums
Former members include: Max Moon: Drums Wade Knight: [[Drums[]] Nick Alessandrini: Percussion Acer Aspire 3000: Phat Beatz Corey Montgomery: Guitar/Vocals Nick Shope: Bass Josh Goodpaster: Trumpet
Discography
edit- School Spirit EP (December 2007)
- Life Is Grand EP (May 2008)