Steel Panther's Michael Starr is dealing with his first dose of fame.
"I'm at the doctor getting some penicillin," claims the newly minted hair-metal hero with a laugh, down the line from Burbank, Calif.
"Dude, I am not kidding! I don't know what the (blank) is going on, but I got something going on down there, so I had to come see my bro."
True or not, that ain't all Starr has going on these days. He and his big-wigged bandmates -- guitarist Satchel, bassist Lexxi Foxxx and drummer Stix Zadinia (say that five times fast) -- are sitting on one of the unlikeliest hit CDs of the fall.
The Spandex-sporting sleaze-rock outfit's debut disc Feel the Steel -- a hilariously over-the-top spoof of '80s hair-metal bands such as Bon Jovi, Van Halen and Poison, complete with fearsome guitar shredding, tight-trousered vocals and lyrics offensive enough to make David Lee Roth blush -- has rocketed straight to the top of the Billboard chart (OK, the comedy chart, but still).
It's landed them festival gigs from Japan to England, and has critics calling them the new Spinal Tap.
This after 10 years of toiling in the metal trenches of Los Angeles. In short, as Starr puts it in our exclusive Canadian interview: "Life is (blank)ing good."
"I am stoked. I've never had a No. 1 album. I don't care if it's in the category of Oldest Heavy Metal Band in the World. If people find it funny, buy the record and laugh your ass off. Because you know what?
"We're like herpes; you can't stop Steel Panther from bringing heavy metal back. We just keep coming back, slow and steady."
