The Offspring
The Offspring are a popular American punk band consisting of vocalist and guitarist Dexter Holland, Kevin 'Noodles' Wasserman (also on guitar), bassistist Greg K and Ron Welty on drums (pre 2003) replaced by Atom Willard on drums (post 2003).On March 18, 2003, Ron Welty left The Offspring to devote all his energies on a new band "Steady Ground". The Offspring held hundreds of auditions for a new drummer, finally deciding to announce Atom Willard as the new drummer. Atom Willard was in Rocket From The Crypt for ten years and more recently played with "Moth", the Alkaline Trio and "Melissa Auf Der Maur".
Although their first album, The Offspring, was very similar to late 1980s punk, the next album, Ignition, saw them move away from more traditional punk, heading into the pop-punk of the mid-1990s with songs like "Dirty Magic". It was 1994's Smash that brought Offspring into the mainstream; that album sold over eleven million copies worldwide. Punk rock purists derided Smash as a sell out to pop audiences that had little connection to punk rock's ideals and standards.
The Offspring had always tended, on each album, to have a couple of songs based on social/political subject matter, a testament to their punk roots. Songs like "Jennifer Lost The War" and "Kill The President" on The Offspring, "L.A.P.D" on Ignition, "It'll Be A Long Time" and "Not the One" on Smash, and "Meaning Of Life" and "Change the World" on Ixnay On The Hombre, communicated the band's general position on social and political issues (though the band has not been known to be outspoken or active politically, especially by punk standards).
Ixnay On The Hombre, The Offspring's fourth album, much awaited by fans of Smash and the earlier releases, was a commercial success. Although Smash was the album that originally brought The Offspring into commercial success and wide recognition, it was the release of "Pretty Fly (For A White Guy)" from the 1998 album Americana which established the band as a regular feature on MTV and established The Offspring as a regular chart presence. Their latest is Splinter.
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