RATT To Tour U.S. With SCORPIONS

Icon vs. Icon recently conducted an interview with RATT drummer Bobby Blotzer. A couple of excerpts from the chat follow below.

Icon vs. Icon: Obviously you've been involved with the record from day one, but where do you think this stacks up against your previous releases with RATT?

Blotzer: I definitely think it's in the same ballpark as "Out of the Cellar" and "Invasion" ("Invasion of Your Privacy"),I'd put it in between those two records. This is a good thing. I'm definitely not one to tell people "Oh, this is the best thing ever." if it's not great. I'm not going to just hype it up. I'll do interviews for it, like the last one that we did. I liked that record. Do I think it was a great RATT record? No, I didn't think it was a great RATT record. I thought there were a handful of really good songs, and I just think that Stephen's heart wasn't into that record and I wasn't crazy about the production and the way it went. Although I like Richie Zito, there were just too many things thrown into that thing. John Kalodner making us write sixty fucking songs, it was just too much. It took too long for the process, by the time we finally got into the studio everybody was just like "Let's get this fucking thing done." [laughs]

Icon vs. Icon: Now you brought in Carlos Cavazo for this record, what did he bring into the mix, in your opinion?

Blotzer: Well he's real easy to work with, it's like he just wants to learn. It's like he is Switzerland. Rob is Canada. Me, Stephen and Warren are Russia, Germany and Korea. I don't know. [laughs] It helps to keep things going in a metal way. Carlos had a couple of song ideas that ended up on the record. The first one, "Best of Me" is now a single. He's very open minded, that's what I like about him and Robbie in general.

Icon vs. Icon: What can we expect from RATT in regards to your tour plans?

Blotzer: We're touring, we've got a bunch of shows going all through April and a bunch in May that are kind of fly-out stuff. Then, June 8th we leave for Europe for six weeks. Playin all these huge festivals all over the place over there. We'll come back here and there's a big tour coming out. Actually I'm sitting here talking to you and I'm hearing "Click, click", it's e-mails coming in and I'm waiting for news of the announcement of this tour that we're going to be doing starting in July and into August. It's going to be a big tour. And I just got this announcement! I can let you in on, the SCORPIONS are who we're going to be touring with this year.

Icon vs. Icon: Is that going to be a U.S. tour?

Blotzer: Yes, a U.S. tour later with the SCORPIONS. But anyhow, once we go through summer here and Europe and then back here we're going to go through South America, Australia, Japan and Canada.

Icon vs. Icon: Looking back what do you feel your defining moment as a musician has been, with RATT or in general?

Blotzer: My defining moment would obviously be when RATT and I as a band had a platinum success. That defines where everyone wants to go as a musician, everybody wants to be a success, a platinum artist and headline arenas. I dreamed about it my whole life, and really, while I dreamt about it, I just never believed really that it could happen. I started playing in arenas before I was in RATT with a band called Vic Vergat when we were on tour with NAZARETH in 1981, so I had a little taste of playing arenas. When I joined RATT I was like "Wow, I wonder if this band could ever get to that level?" because you know we had some good songs and were still sluggin' it out on The Strip. We started getting more popular then, once we started selling out multiple nights in clubs, there was something clicking there. There was something clicking here and the metal movement was really gathering steam and the snowball was growing. July 27th of '83 we got signed to Atlantic, we were in the studio in September, the record was out in February and by summer we were headlining arenas. So it was absolutely amazing. We were already touring and watching "Out of the Cellar" climb and getting popular in every state. That was great to be a local band from L.A. and get out of your local surroundings and be known name by name for each member of the band, and loved by fans. That's an unbelievable feeling. And so the defining moment is obviously accomplishing that and to keep this going. Tomorrow (March 11th) I celebrate my 28th year for my anniversary of joining RATT. So at this point it's like a life sentence! [laughs]

Read the entire interview at Icon vs. Icon.