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The Fat Cats original guitar player Dave Bednars left shortly after the arrival of lead guitar player Richard Duffney. In 1992 the band recruited lead singer and front man Doug Newman (Big Bapa). Doug and Richard had been involved since high school and played together from 1972 until about 1985 in countless projects and groups.

Prior to ’The Fat Cats’, Big Bapa had been touring with Fargo Moorhead based cover band ShyBoy. Both ShyBoy and the Debonaires were voted, in the Fargo Forum, Fargo/Moorhead’s most popular and favorite bands 3 years running.

The Fat Cats added and subtracted a few members. In 1994 lead guitar, keyboardist, and vocalist Kerry Boyd was recruited. Kerry had also been a member of The Debonaires but at the time was living in Atlanta, Georgia. So the guys unloaded the band trailer and Steve drove down to Georgia to pick up Kerry and his newly wed wife Terrie and brought them back to Minnesota. A week later he was on stage with ’The Fat Cats’ at an abate rally in northern Minnesota. Kerry turned out to be a natural fit for the group.

’The Fat Cats’ have been fortunate to thrill their audiences throughout the midwest. The venues they performed at considered them a huge success and always brought them back when the band was available.

In 1995 the band turned its attention to writing and recording and feverishly completed their first project entitled ’The Fat Cats : RUB’.

In 1998 ’The Fat Cats’ were starting to really shake up the music scene, getting air play, playing high profile gigs and sharing the stage with rock legends such as: Boston, ZZ Topp, REO Speedwagon, Little Feat, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Eric Burdon, Head East, The Spinners, The Byrds, and many more.

In 2000 ’The Fat Cats’ had grown weary from gigging and going through over twelve different drummers with the absence of Steve due to injury. Honestly, in a few short years we went through more drummers than Spinal Tap. One of whom was Michael Shannon, inductee of Minnesota Music Hall of Fame, former drummer of the Uglys, Cadillac, The Fat Cats, among others, was tragically sticken with cancer. Michael, coincidently was mentor and taught Steve how to drum. (Personal Note): Mike insisted on putting the woodwork in our bathroom. He said, "That way, every morning, while you are taking care of business, you can think of me." And we do. Another talented drummer lost to tragedy was Todd Blatsky from Fargo, North Dakota. Todd was injured while at work and totally shattered his wrists. All of which happened while the Fat Cats were reaching an apogee in their musical careers.

After going through a succession of drummers, tired and discouraged, the band decided to slow down and quit touring so intensely. They informed their agents G.M.A., Mpls, R.A.M., St.Paul, and Headliner Talent, Int. and others they would no longer be touring. They quit maintaining their website and called it quits.

However, because of the news of ’The Fat Cats’ and their rising reputation of being the ultimate party band as well as CD sales from their first project that had been circulating, the group had seemed to develop a following and a life of its own. Despite the fact that each member had an unlisted phone number, no agent representation, no website, and made absolutely no effort whatsoever to book engagements, venues, festivals, resorts, and clubs alike out of nowhere managed to resource a contact that somehow knew how to get ahold of one of the members to secure an engagement. This may be hard to believe but not only did this keep the guys performing even more than they wanted to, but most of their highest paying and highest profile engagements have come to them in this state of limbo.

With the return of Steve, their original drummer, ’The Fat Cats’ have matured into a tight groove band. Each member has been said by music critics to master the stage with distinct personalities of their own, as a group with common vision while still allowing each member to showcase their skills and musical prowess with each of their instruments.

Today ’The Fat Cats’ are playing to national and international audiences, appearing annually at Dragfest, Terrace Bay, Ont.,Canada; repeat engagements in San Pedro, Belize, Central America, with offers to tour Europe and the U.K. and exclusive resorts in Mexico.

Today the guys all say they have a whole new fire motivating them and ’The Fat Cats’ have shifted into high gear! Starting a whole new chapter in the lives of these veteran musicians as well as having access to a pool of other musicians and friends to add to the mix if the engagement and budget allows for live performances and/or any recording project they are currently working on.

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