Review RATT ‘The Atlantic Years 1984-1990‘

One of the bands that had an impact on the 80s hard rock scene are Ratt. The band started in 1976 as Mickey Ratt before transforming into Ratt in 1981. The heydays of the group started in 1984 when the band released with “Out of the Cellar” a debut that featured with ‘Round and Round’ a song, that helped the quintet to get some solid attention. It was also the first song I heard of the band, as ‘Round and Round’ was played at a metal show on Swiss radio station DRS3.

Produced by the legendary Beau Hill, the album was the springboard for Ratt to become one of the forerunners of glam metal. The sophomore release ‘Invasion of Your Privacy’ was next and Ratt picked it up where they left off with the debut. Songs like ‘You’re in Love’ and ‘Lay it Down’ are exquisite melodic metal songs and certainly also the artwork of the first two releases helped Ratt to gain some extra attention.

Platinum, that is what the band achieved with the first two releases and the following ‘Dancing Undercover’ showed a continuation of a winning streak for the band. Glam metal was established and as being one of the forerunners, Ratt had a very solid position in this field. ‘Dancing Undercover’ features also two single releases. ‘Dance’ and ‘Body Talk’ are well-crafted melodic metal songs although they could catch up with the earlier hits of the band. Even being a part of the “The Golden Child” movie soundtrack couldn’t help to establish ‘Body Talk’ as a real hit single. Instead of being equipped with an oustanding hit, ‘Dancing Undercover’ is a more wholistic album in a sense, that the totality of songs is on a good level. There are now ups and downs. Each of the songs is a little treat without jumping out from the rest, like on the first two records and it’s a bit heavier too.

Two years later, the bluesier ‘Reach for the Sky’ entered the record stores. Already the artwork showed a change and also the sound of Ratt got a slightly different feel. After the first two longplayers, already ‘Dancing Undercover” showcased a band that looked for a new twist to their music and ‘Reach for the Sky’ is a next step on this journey. The fourth album was also the last one that included Beau Hill as producer before Ratt switched to Sir Arthur Payson who was at the helm for ‘Detonator’.

Album number five presents a band that matured and was looking for some new inspiration for their music. At the same time, Ratt lost some of the untamed wildness of the first releases. Also co-writing songs with Desmond Child couldn’t help the band to revive the earlier spirit and success. ‘Detonator’ still reached gold status in the US and at the same time was first release that doesn’t get to platinum.

After boxsets of bands like Dokken, Mötley Crüe and Overkill have been released, ‘Ratt – The Atlantic Years’ is a next box that hits the shelves and since it is also available as vinyl, fans of the band might be interested even though it come with a rather high price.

Out of the Cellar