(1) Why did you put "Keep Me Hanging On" on the ENDLESS STRUGGLE album? Was there a special kind of reason behind it?
[Pat]: That version of The Supremes' hit was arranged by Vanilla Fudge, a late '60s psychedelic band and band favorite. Mikey loved Tim Bogert’s bass playing, and we were paying tribute to one of the muses.
[Tony]: It was a song that the Dicks use to do at the end of their set to start out with. At some point everyone wanted to us to do it as well, perhaps Gary Floyd might have sung it one night with us, which got the whole thing started. Anyhow, it was the song we played to end our set, so everyone could have the opportunity to grab the microphone and yell, "Set me free, why dontcha BAAAABE," then jump off the stage.
When we were recording ENDLESS STRUGGLE, we needed an extra song to finish out the album with, because we still had a bit of time to use up on the record. So we recorded it; Rabid Cat had to get permission and everything. I think it's cool, I wish we had recorded our version of "Playing with Fire" instead, with our improvised jam that we did live every once in a while.
(2) On your first record, the LOST CAUSES 45 from 1981, you sounded pretty much like a Clash-typed style band. But then on the 1983 album WE MUST REBEL you took a 360-degree turn and raised hell. Husker Du too went through such a transition. How came the turn?
[Pat]: When we got rolling in 1979, we were still discovering the recently-departed first punk wave, and being impressionable youngsters we all sucked everything in like sponges. For me it was the summer of 1981, when I discovered hardcore bands like DOA, Circle Jerks, and Black Flag, that essentially altered my definition of punk rock. The early hardcore scene seemed to suit the Offenders well, having all been huge '70s hard rock and metal concert-goers throughout our adolescence. (Tony saw Hendrix open for The Monkees in Germany!) The new and original music bubbling up from all the diverse regional scenes in the US was something small town and suburban teens could easily relate to.
[Tony]: It was 1978 when we formed the OFFENDERS. I was working at one of the few record stores in Texas that stocked the latest punk rock records from England. We all had hard rock roots and influences, Mountain, West Bruce and Laing and Kiss (Mikey), Led Zeppelin. But we wanted to do a punk band, and we were listening to a lot of Clash and Sex Pistols and other cool bands we were discovering, so we learned how to play as a band by playing punk songs instead of the usual hard rock songs all the local cover bands were playing. So naturally our early songs were more Clash (punk) inspired. We were trying to be musical and real musicians, and plus our singer at the time, Mick had lived in England for a while and projected that image. As we got better as a band, we wanted to have a more harder, faster, louder sound ... to mix our hard rock influences and roots with the English punk rock we had been listening to. Mick was not into this direction so he left the band and we found J.J. (John Jacobson) and started moving in that harder, faster direction. Several other punk bands were doing this at the time: it was a natural progression in punk rock.
*****
July 21, 2008
Our MySpace friend, formerly known as PUNX NOT DEAD, who now signs on as an elipsis asks: Why do you think the hardcore movement died out like it did?
[Tony]: I don't think it ever really died. It has relocated to Europe and Japan, and it is very much alive on MySpace.
[Pat]: I don’t agree that it “died out.” I think the hardcore punk ethos still exists out there, there’s certainly a lot of bands still flying the flag. Just like today, the early days were just a product of everyone’s environment and individual perspectives. Popular music got all confused in the late eighties and 1990s by overhybridization (rap metal, yechh!,) then with the acceptance of Grunge as the new punk, and the suits and ties co-opted the underground ethos. Now they use it to sell Jaguars and dish soap to upwardly mobile young professionals.
*****
June 27, 2008
Three More Questions from Jeff Buzzcrusher, Austin, TX:
1). All-time favorite punk album?
[Pat] Let Them Eat Jellybeans Compilation – 1980
[Tony] Since you said "Punk" and not “Hardcore,” I will have to go with any Stranglers records
2). All-time favorite musicians?
[Pat] Lemmy, Glenn Tipton, Louis Armstrong, J. S. Bach
[Tony] Leslie West, Jeff Buzzcrusher
3). Favorite thing to do in Austin?
[Pat] Swimming at Windy Point Park on Lake Travis
[Tony] Smoke in the non-smoking areas.
*****
June 20, 2008
Three Questions from Jeff Buzzcrusher, Austin, TX:
1. Best show you ever played?
[Tony] All the shows that did not suck. The New Years Eve 83 show in L.A. with the Dead Kennedy's was a standout tho'
[Pat] Woodshock Festival, August 1986, Austin Texas. Our last official show.
2. Favorite album or song?
[Tony] Endless Struggle
[Pat] The eternally unanswerable question.
3. Memorable moment?
[Tony] a)When da cops came bustin' in in St. Louis. b) Opening for the Ramones and hanging with them after the show backstage. The Slayer/Offenders show in San Antonio where it rained beer cans.
[Pat] The morning we awoke to copious amounts of Mikey’s feces smeared across several of Tony’s brother-in-law’s walls in Croton, New York, July 1985.
*****
May 25, 2008
Q [paul, Haarlem, Netherlands]: Why this sudden Offenders (myspace)revival (all the flyers/posts/trivia/Q&A etc)? Why not years ago (perhaps zines)?
A [Tony]: Well, we just got this page up just a few months ago. While we may not have been a working band for many years, we all felt that the music was great and that it would always be listened to and enjoyed. That's why we always tried to keep our stuff available. Working with independent labels can be limited, since they tend to distribute to a given region. The Offenders never had any trouble making new fans and friends: we became more popular after we broke up in the late 80's than we were while we were a band. Mainly, it was just a matter of getting the music to those who would like it. MySpace has been great for that. We have gotten so many new friends and fans I'm honored and humbled. And kids dude! The kids are listening to us as well. So the music has transcended generations.
My only wish was that, perhaps, things could have been different for us back then; we didn't get too many "breaks," and I wish we could have produced a couple more LP's. Offenders will never fade into the sunset of the past, as long as there are MySpace friends, kids like Charlie Brown, and Josh and Miss Bill S. Preston Esq. We will live on.
*****
May 16, 2008
Q [Craig Legg, Birmingham, AL]: Tony, how did you learn to play guitar? Chet Atkins correspondence course? Mel Bay how-to books? Classical lessons? Who are your influences and/or guitar heroes?
A [Tony]: I picked up my first guitar when I was living in West Germany in the 70's as an Army Brat. My best friend Larry Gilbert and I wanted to be cool and we were both really getting into rock music at the time (~'72); and we both wanted to learn to be guitarists, so maybe some girls would talk to us. We were both working as bagboys in the Commisary in Bad Kreuznach so we had money to buy our own guitars with.
We went down to the local music store in Bad K, and both of us bought matching 6 and 12 string Framus acoustic guitars. An okay brand of guitar, but it was my first instrument and I was really stoked to learn. We knew this fella who hung around the base, an American named Allen Simon: he always use to use the expression "DYNOMITE" so we called him Funky Allen Simon. Allen was a pretty decent guitarist, so we asked him if he would give us some lessons. So Allen would come over to Larry's once a week and he would teach us some chords, show us how to fingerpick, ("Blackbird" by the Beatles) and other odds and ends. We took lessons for several weeks, then Allen went back to the States. After that it was all self-taught. I learned a lot of acoustic style songs back then, because I only had the acoustic. It wasn't until I got to Texas at Fort Hood that I found the music store in Killeen and bought my first electric guitar, a Gibson, the "Midnight Special," it was called; they only produced them for a few years in the '70s. Mine was blond and had a two octave neck. My first amp was an Ampeg VT-22 100 watt self-contained unit -- very loud, loved it for it's loudness.
Not too long after I got the Ampeg, I had the chance to buy a used Marshall stack cheap, $700: I jumped on it. Once I had the Gibson and the Marshall, my playing improved, and once I was playing with Mikey and Pat, my playing got even better. So that's how I learned guitar.
My guitar hero: Leslie West of Mountain; always has been always will be, Mr. Tone himself.
*****
May 9, 2008
Q [n!k, West Covina, CA]: Do you guys still play? If not, why not?
A [Pat]: Aside from a brief reunion in 2002, no. The reunion experience did not go particularly well and reminded some of us of why the band disintegrated in 1986.
A [Tony]: We have not played as a working band since the late 80's. We did have a reunion in 2002. Played a great show at Emo's here in Austin, we had thoughts of remaining as a band at that time. But J.J. got busted yet again, and was sentenced to two years in jail. We tried to continue with a new lead singer Anthony Willamson, a.k.a. Anthony Combatant, who gave it all he had, but it just was not the same without J.J. Plus, Mikey still had some personal issues which sadly eventually lead to his untimely death. Like Pat said, unfortunately it wasn't much different than the issues we faced in the 80's.
Mikey Donaldson, Tony Johnson and I formed the Offenders in Killeen, Texas in late 1978. After a few tryouts with some different singers, we eventuially hired Mick Buck, a guy who had a real knack for exuding coolness, something the rest of us sorely lacked.
In 1980 we moved to Austin and began playing places like Rauls' Club and Duke's Royal Coach Inn. July 1981 saw the self-release of our first single, "Lost Causes/ Rockin' the Town." Our sound then was the Clash-Buzzcocks-British wave punk style. Soon thereafter though, we were taking notice of what many US punk bands were doing. Faster, more hardcore sounds coming from the likes of Bad Brains, Circle Jerks, D.O.A. and the DKs inspired us to take our sound up a notch. But Mick was not up for the new direction we were taking, so he and the band parted ways in early 1982.
We wasted no time in picking up singer J.J. Jacobson. J.J. had no musical training but was freshly (dropped) out of high school and full of teen angst, so it seemed a perfect fit. We quickly gained regional attention with our self-styled brand of hardcore. Bands such as MDC, Die Kreuzen, Corrosion of Conformity, and Toxic Reasons helped us to forge an alliance with many like-minded punks and fans nationwide. By 1984, we were totally immersed in the burgeoning underground scene that would (sadly) eventually take punk into the mainstream.
The first LP "We Must Rebel" (R Radical) was released in July 1983. We toured the West Coast and Midwest after its release and by then had established a solid following throughout Texas and Louisiana. "I Hate Myself/ Bad Times" (45/ Rabid Cat) was released in 1984. Various other cuts appear on compilations such as Cottage Cheese from the Lips of Death," Metal Moo Cow," "Bands on the Block," and "P.E.A.C.E." And, of couurse, we continued to tour throughout 1984.
In 1985, we hired SST stalwart Spot to produce our second LP "Endless Struggle" (Rabid Cat). It was released in June '85, just in time for the eastern leg of a planned nationwide tour. But, van problems and our increasing mutual contempt proved to be too much, causing us to conclude the tour in October before a western leg could be booked.
In the last few months of 1985, Mikey was devoting a lot of time to playing bass with MDC, which by then was based in San Francisco. Mikey had been the Offenders' primary songwriter, and his absence began taking its toll on the band's muse. After a Mardi Gras show in New Orleans in February 1986 (one of our best performances, ironically), Mikey announced announced that he was moving to SF. He would be joining (ex-Dicks) Gary Floyd's band, Sister Double Happiness. And so after eight years together, we called it quits. We played our final show at the Woodshock festival in Wimberly, Texas in August 1986.
The US hardcore scene in the 1980s was truly unique. The term "D.I.Y." is an overused one to be sure. But, in those pre-internet days things like 45s, fanzines, mailing lists, and wax-coated postage stamps were indispensable tools to those of us wanting to hear and produce great new music. The music may have faded some, but the fact that you're reading this today proves that the independent spirit spawned by the movement clearly lives on.
Hey company estem recopilant material audio-visual per reeditar, que aquesta divertida banda de Punk-Oi!-Hardcore, va fer entre 1.987 i 1.999. Els autentics TOY DOLLS de Barcelona!!!
Thanks for the add! OFFENDERS were amazing. The most intense live shows I've seen and I'M old and I've seen alot. My fantasy concert was always an OFFENDERS-Motorhead show. I've got " We Must Rebel" and "Died In custody" on CD. I heard their was a new Anthology coming out and found this page. I've been turning people onto OFFENDERS for years, THE MOST UNDERRATED BAND. R.I.P. Mikey,I'll never forget the times we drank beer together and had great time. Good Luck to Pat ,Anthony and of course J.J.! I guess back in the 80's I would've been considered an OFFENDERS groupie!!!
Online Now!
Good cyberspace Mornin' to ya Brother!
