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BiographyThe Basics The Offspring started out with Bryan "Dexter" Holland,
Greg Kreisel, and James Lilja in 1984. The group was called
Manic Subsidal. Later, Noodles (Kevin Wasserman) joined, and the band soon changed its name to The Offspring. The name was derived from the band, The Descendants (Descendants-Offspring, synonyms). James Lilja soon had to quit the band while working on their first album to spend more time in medical school.
He's now a doctor in Houston. Ron Welty, only sixteen at the time,
knew Dexter through his older step-sister and begged him to let him join the
band. Dexter soon agreed, and the present Offspring was formed. Discography 1989 marked the release of the band's first album, The Offspring, on Nemesis. They didn't have many funds so The Offspring invited some friends over, offered them free beer, and they collectively glued the album covers together. The original self-titled albums are very rare; there are about 1,000 original copies in circulation today. Ignition followed in 1992. This album didn't prove to be a huge success at the time. They moved on to a bigger punk label, Epitaph, managed by Brett Gurwitz, formerly of Bad Religion. The turning point in the band's career came about in 1994 with Smash. The album went platinum with the help of songs such as Come Out and Play, Self-Esteem, and Gotta Get Away. This album proved to be less "punk" as the first two albums and the band received a lot of criticism for their musical eclecticism from fellow punk bands. One year later The Offspring re-released their self-titled album with Nitro records, Dexter's own record company (more info. on Nitro below). The success of Smash aided in bringing this album, as well as Ignition, into the light. In 1997, the fourth album, Ixnay on the Hombre reached the shelves. The album had many singles, including Gone Away, The Meaning of Life, and All I Want. However, this album didn't fare as well as Smash on the charts, but it still sold over 5 million copies on a major record label, Columbia Records. The band's most current album, Americana, which came out in November of 1998, proved to be a hit. Songs like Pretty Fly (For a White Guy), Why Don't You Get a Job?, and The Kids Aren't Alright brought the band back into the mainstream.
For a complete listing of songs by The Offspring, please visit my discography page. Video (Before Americana) "We deliberately shot our videos with fucked-up film and black light because we don't want to be seen too well," says Holland "Once they see a close-up of your face plastered on the screen, it's over. There's no more mystery or fun to it." The Offspring turned down offers from David Letterman and Conan O'Brien
for the same reason. "We've always decided that we don't want to do much TV right now because we don't want to be overexposed," says
Kriesel. "Not to knock Green Day, 'cause I like Green Day, but its, like, every time you turn on MTV, you see Billie Joe's face." (from Rolling Stone, 2/9/95 Issue 701, p42, 4p, 2c.) Look for these music videos: Member Bios Ron Welty: drums Gregory David Kreisel: bass Kevin Wasserman: guitar, background vocals Bryan Keith Holland: vocals, guitar I got the following information on Dexter from an interview. In it, Joey Ramone interviews Dexter Holland. It's really interesting, so I suggest you go read it yourself (just click here), but it's four pages long. I picked out the interesting stuff for people like me who don't have enough patience to read a Curious George book. likes: watching talk shows, Yoo Hoo, Aerosmith, Nirvana, Smashing Pumpkins, alternative music Nitro Records
Punk label
For more information, visit official Nitro site.
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