Steel Panther are the best rock band you’ve never heard of.

They are indisputably the best heads-down, no-nonsense hard-rockin’ – and indeed, hard- lovin’ – band at work today. Their MySpace page is called “Steel Panther Kick Ass” and under their “Sounds Like” section they have: “A thousand times cooler than whatever’s on your f***ing iPod right now!”

Graduates of the Los Angeles "keg party" circuit back in the 1980s, Steel Panthers were the prototypical hair metal band. Not that you'd read that in the Hair Metal Encyclopedia: they've been treacherously written out of the musical history books.

As singer Michael Starr puts it: “Most of the other bands were jealous about all the chicks we were nailing and they were wondering how we were getting these great gigs. The bottom line is, we’re pioneers in what we’re doing. Poison totally ripped me off – I was the first guy to come out with blonde hair and tight pants and a bandana.”

What Steel Panther did back in the 1980s was "to take the dream that led to the 1959 invention of Spandex and realise it". Songs such as Asian Hookerand a desire to put the "Strip" into Sunset Strip, as well as blistering live shows, led to an ever-increasing fan base. Or, as the band have it: "Entire communities of hot chicks moved to LA because of us."

There was a massive major label bidding war for them, with millions of dollars in advances being offered. Sadly, however, Steel Panther never showed up for their big showcase gig at which they were supposed to sign said lucrative first contract. “When you have all the blow and the strippers you want, you don’t really look at the clock,” reasons Starr.

Somewhere along the line they got lost in a fug of hairspray, and the odd criminal record (resulting from intense inter-band "bonding" sessions) didn't really help. But now, more than 20 years after they were first helped into their extra-tight Spandex, they have finally released a debut album, Feel the Steel. With song titles such as Death to All But Metal, Hell's on Fireand the heavily nuanced Eatin' Ain't Cheatin' ("It doesn't make me unfaithful unless I'm laying down the cable"), the Panthers are looking to reclaim what was rightfully theirs all those years ago.

“The music, the art form, hasn’t really changed,” says Satchel, Steel Panther’s guitarist. “Heavy metal is all about looking killer and wearing bitching clothes.”

Musically, Satchel says the band are influenced by "alcohol, pot, ecstasy and Valtrex"; lyrically they've managed to combine poetic flights of fancy with prosaic earthiness. The song Community Propertyfeatures the chorus line: "My heart belongs to you but my cock is community property."

By running with, and even surpassing, all the very worst excesses of 1980s hair metal, Steel Panthers are undoubtedly a post-hair outfit who know the subtle difference between imitation and subversion. Yes, they may sound like a Poison or a Europe in their more reflective moments, but when they up the tempo they can rock you to your very foundation with some brilliant musicianship. It’s quite difficult for any band to out-Mötley Crüe the Crue, but Steel Panthers can do it in under three minutes. And how can you not love a lyric such as “I would give you the stars in the sky, but they’re too far away”.

To some, the Panthers are a retro lewd’n’crude outfit pedalling rocks’s worst clichés; to others they’re a “joke parody band”. But that’s all just jealous carping from the milksop end of the musical spectrum. Put it this way: who would you rather go for a drink with – Steel Panthers or Fleet Foxes?

Buy Feel the Steeland put it where it rightly belongs: at the toppermost of the poppermost. Screw emo – hair metal rules. www.steel panthersrock.com

bboyd@irishtimes.com