Description
White Boy And The Average Rat Band was formed in the small secluded Virginia mountain town Richlands around 1979 after guitarist and founder Mike Matney returned from a short stint with a band in Nashville, Tennessee. Once back home Matney began to put together his Average Rat Band consisting of bassist Tommy Altizer (R.I.P) , rhythm guitarist Seth Kelly and Tim Gilbert. In 1980 the project was ready to go into a small local studio and record a slap of do it yourself heaviness. The 8-track album would see a modest release of 300 and limited distribution beyond the band’s means. Jump forward several years and White Boy And The Average Rat Band was now an obscure memory, but the album the band released was beginning to be remembered, remembered and discovered by collectors worldwide who would be paying hundreds of dollars to get one of these pieces of wax in their collections. Every fan of post punk and proto-metal would have this record topping their want-list. White Boy And The Average Rat Band, contrary to their name, are incredibly weird. Not that they’re original – they are, in fact, incredibly unoriginal, showing clear influence from a number of famous bands of the time – it’s just that the White Boy And The Average Rat Band separate their unoriginality into neatly isolated little pockets. The self-titled and only record of the band sounds at first like a cover album; you’ll hear Judas Priest, Black Sabbath, and Motorhead; the catch is, the material is all original. Yes, this is a worship band that essentially worships a different band on (nearly) every track. Less charitably, this is a cover band that released an album of covers that let them avoid paying royalties and licensing fees to the original bands and labels. The soundalike tracks are easy to spot – “Neon Warriors” is “Neon Knights” with a little Judas Priest thrown in, and “Maybe I’m a Fool” is Motorhead through and through. “The Prophet Song” is a Cliffs Notes version of “War Pigs”, while “Oriental Doctors” and “Leaving Tonight on Vacation” are early Judas Priest pastiches with a little 70s Scorpions sprinkled on top. They’re all fun, quick tracks, with none longer than 5 minutes and two less than 3. If you can’t be original, it pays to be brief, and this band don’t waste anyone’s time. Certainly nothing here is better than the original bands, but nothing here makes them spin in their graves, either. Tying together what would normally be a rather schizophrenic album is the raw, overdriven guitar tone and vocals that can best be described as lackadaisical but with “kind of charming” as a footnote. The exception is the aforementioned “Maybe I’m a Fool”, which features a passable Lemmy imitation. The whole “production” has a very garage-rehearsal-like sound to it, and is distinct enough from the crisp studio jobs of the bands they imitate to set them apart, if only a little. Lead guitarist and band mastermind Mike Matney is actually quite capable in a hard rock way, sounding like he has spent plenty of time on bar stages, and the instrumental side of the Rat Band in general is competent and enjoyable. So White Boy And The Average Rat Band arent going to knock your socks off one way or the other, but the band apes their idols well and succinctly enough that nobody who enjoys the sweet sound of rocking heavy metal will have a chance to get bored.
Track list:
1. Prelude
2. Neon Warriors
3. Sector 387
4. Maybe I’m A Fool
5. The Prophet Song
6. Leaving Tonight On Vacation
7. Blue Moon
8. Oriental Doctors
9. Tell Someone
10. Will To Fight
11. Smokehouse Blues
12. Phone Call From New York
13. If I Find Love