You bet, David! Twenty-odd years ago when my brother and I started barbecuing (using ECB's), we had never heard of rubs, so did our ribs and briskets with salt, pepper, and garlic powder. Turned out pretty good. Later, we found a barbecue spice made by a local company (Cain's), and started using that. Now that we are older and wiser, we make our own rubs and are very happy with the results. After a recent move, I couldn't find any of my BBQ stuff (still in boxes), so I did a couple of racks of ribs au natural. Not too bad. Certainly beats doing without! I think it is a good idea to do that once in a while, so you can see what the baseline tastes like. Then, add spices as needed.
Mark