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NOFX is a Punk Rock band from Los Angeles, California. They have 12 albums. Their members are as follows: Fat Mike (Michael Burkett) on bass and lead vocals, El Hefe (Aaron Abeyta) on lead guitar, Eric Melvin on rhythm guitar, and Erik Sandin on drums. Scott Sellers, Scott Aldahl, Dave Allen, Dave Casillas, and Steve Kidwiller were previous members in NOFX, however Fat Mike and Eric Melvin have both been there since they formed NOFX in 1983.

Discography:

  • Liberal Animation (1988)
  • S&M Airlines (1989)
  • Ribbed (1991)
  • Maximum Rocknroll (compilation album of demos, 1992)
  • White Trash, Two Heebs, and a Bean (1992)
  • Punk in Drublic (1994)
  • I Heard They Suck Live! (live album, 1995)
  • Heavy Petting Zoo (1996)
  • So Long And Thanks For All The Shoes (1997)
  • Pump Up The Valuum (2000)
  • 45 Or 46 Songs That Weren't Good Enough To Go On Our Other Records (compilation album, 2002)
  • The War On Errorism (2003)
  • The Greatest Songs Ever Written (By Us!) (greatest hits album, 2004)
  • Wolves in Wolves' Clothing (2006)
  • They've Actually Gotten Worse Live! (live album, 2007)
  • Coaster (2009)
  • Self Entitled (2012)
  • First Ditch Effort (2016)
  • Single Album (2021)
  • Double Album (2022)


Tropes that apply to this band:

  • Accentuate the Negative: The liner notes for their greatest hits album, The Greatest Songs Ever Written (By Us) contain clippings of the most negative reviews the band has ever received, including one from a critic who claimed that a bite on his penis from a deer tick he'd recently gotten while camping was pleasant compared to the album he was reviewing.
  • Added Alliterative Appeal: "Philthy Phil Philanthropist"
  • Apathetic Citizens: "Franco Un-American" is from the perspective of who's been largely apathetic to the greater issues of the world like global warming, animal rights and corrupt governments, only to become shocked by the damage they've done and vow to no longer sit idly by and let such things happen.
  • Apocalypse How: "Just the Flu"
  • Bestiality Is Depraved: The cover to Heavy Petting Zoo depicts a man cuddling in a...rather interesting way with a lamb. Then there's the cover of Eating Lamb, depicting him in a 69 position...make note that the album has no references to bestiality, nor animals or zoos in general, at all.
  • Break Up Song: "I Have One Jealous Again, Again" (a downer sequel to War on Errorism's "We Have Two Jealous Agains") and "Your Last Resort"
  • Cool and Unusual Punishment: They have a song by this title, though it's about a different subject entirely.
  • Cover Version: S&M Airlines has a cover of "Go Your Own Way", performed with Greg Graffin and Brett Gurewitz.
  • Digital Piracy Is Okay/Digital Piracy Is Evil: Parodied in a hidden advertisement for The War On Errorism on their EP Regaining Unconsciousness, which ends with El Hefe encouraging the listener to go pick up the album at their nearest independent record store, followed by a very fast, half-whispered "Also available for free on the internet."
  • The Diss Track: "Kill Rock Stars", directed at Kathleen Hanna.
  • Distinct Double Album: Attempted and abandoned with Single Album, which as its title suggests, was originally going to be a dobule album before the band decided they didn't have two album's worth of good songs.
  • Death of a Child: In "Doors and Fours"
    His parents didn't need to find their oldest son cold as a fish
  • Divided States of America: "Leaving Jesusland" and "We Called It America", the latter picturing a future where the United States break apart and lose all global relevance as a result.
  • Driven to Suicide: "All His Suits Are Torn", as well as one of the many characters described in "The Decline".
  • Drugs Are Bad/Drugs Are Good: Both topics have been covered in their songs. Songs about the former include "Six Years on Dope" and "Doors and Fours"; songs about the latter include "Herojuana" and "Drugs Are Good".
  • Epic Rocking: "The Decline" runs for over a whopping 18 minutes.
    • "The Big Drag" clocks in at 5 minutes 48 seconds, which for a punk band that usually caps songs at two and a half minutes makes the title quite apt.
  • Eye Scream: The song "Stickin' in my Eye"
  • Fake-Out Fade-Out: Please Play This Song On the Radio goes into a third verse after a brief pause, and becomes a song that you very much cannot play on the radio without a bleeper button.
  • Girl on Girl Is Hot: Mike clearly thinks so, as he's written several songs about lesbians, most notably "Liza and Louise", and in "Creeping Out Sara" he asks her if she and her sister ever had a lesbian threesome.
  • Grief Song: Several examples:
    • "Doornails", dedicated to several members of the punk community who died young and Fat Mike's mother.
    • "I'm So Sorry Tony", dedicated to Tony Sly of No Use for a Name.
      • Tony is also often namedropped in performances of "Doornails" post-2012.
    • "Grieve Soto", dedicated to Steve Soto of Adolescents, also featuring a verse about Darby Crash of The Germs.
  • Hidden Track: So Long And Thanks For All The Fish has a brief clip of Howard Stern playing their song "Drugs Are Good" on the air hidden after the last track - Stern doesn't even let the song play long enough for the vocals to start, dismissing it for not "rocking" enough, comparing it to disco, and suggesting they change their name to No Talent.
  • Hulk Speak: "Whoops I OD'd", sung from the perspective of someone who has overdosed on drugs, features a lot of this.
  • Intentionally Awkward Title: "Don't Call Me White" and White Trash, Two Heebs and a Bean
    • Also, Heavy Petting Zoo
  • Ironic Nickname: Fat Mike is not very fat.
  • Last-Second Word Swap: In "Grieve Soto"
    Now all the bands who got bigger
    Wouldn't dare sing words that Exene and Penelope sang with vigor
    We all know that Jesus Christ was a figment
  • Lead Bassist: Fat Mike is a Type B.
  • Long Runner Lineup: Type 2, as the band's lineup has been the same since 1991.
  • N-Word Privileges. Their White Trash, Two Heebs, and a Bean album. The album's name actually refers to the members of the band, with El Hefe being the "bean", the "two heebs" (heebs being short for Hebrews, as in Jewish people) being Fat Mike and Eric Melvin, and "white trash" being Erik Sandin. According to the CD notes, this was a retreat from the original working title of White Trash, Two Kikes, and a Spic which their parents objected to.
  • Obligatory Bondage Song: A surprising amount of their songs are about S&M.
  • Open-Minded Parent: "What's the Matter With Parents Today?" is about Fat Mike's parents not only supporting but joining in on his punk rockstar lifestyle, to the point where Mike is creeped out, bewildered, and exhausted.
  • Prison Rape: A character in "The Decline" is raped after being incarcerated for a marijuana-related misdemeanor. He soon commits suicide by asphyxiation.
  • Protest Song: "The Decline" again.
    • During the Bush administration the band noticeably became more political in their songs. The War On Errorism, as the title might imply, was mostly made up of these (up to and including the cover art with a caricature of Bush in clown makeup). Fat Mike also produced two compilations in 2004 entitled Rock Against Bush for his label Fat Wreck Chords.
    • Another Bush protest song was 'The Idiot Son of an Asshole." As you can imagine, this one is a bit more on-the-nose and was only ever performed live.
    • "Fish in a Gun Barrel" is directed towards the media frenzy following mass shootings, as well as pro-gun groups.
  • Pun-Based Title: Heavy Petting Zoo and The War on Errorism.
  • Refuge in Audacity: Quite a few songs, but "She's Nubs" off of "The War on Errorism" is a fairly good example. The song depicts a woman who has no arms or legs that enjoys going to punk shows (and who turned down Fat Mike's invitation to go hang out before being carried away in someone's backpack), despite the difficulties she faces in her life. The real life Nubs (a Toronto woman named Talli - who has legs and a job) absolutely loves the song, and says that she wouldn't have turned down Fat Mike in real life. The kicker? The only thing she was offended at about the song was a random line about her inability to "give good head".
  • Self-Deprecation:
    • Their two live albums I Heard They Suck Live! and They've Actually Gotten Worse Live!
    • The album Coaster reference the bands opinion that you would get better use out of it using it as such. The Vinyl version of the album is entitled Frisbee.
    • As mentioned above, the liner notes for The Greatest Songs Ever Written (By Us) contain clips of their most negative reviews and only negative reviews.
    • The tracks "Theme From a NOFX Album" and "60%" are very harsh towards the band, while "Linewleum" calls the song itself "not very good."
  • Sex, Drugs, and Rock & Roll
  • Shout-Out: So Long And Thanks For All The Shoes is a play on a quote from The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: In the book, the last message the dolphins send out to mankind before departing a soon-to-be-destroyed earth is "so long and thanks for all the fish". They replaced "fish" with "shoes" because audiences tend to throw their footwear onstage at outdoor punk shows.
    • "This Machine Is 4" contains several references to the plot of The Sneetches.
  • Spoonerism: Liberal Animation and Punk in Drublic
  • Stage Name: El Hefe and Fat Mike
    • Erik Sandin is normally known as "Smelly", but he's also taken on other aliases in liner notes, usually a Punny Name:
      • S&M Airlines: Erik Shun
      • Ribbed: Groggy Nodbeggar
      • The Longest Line: Seymour Butts
      • White Trash, Two Heebs, and a Bean: Erik Ghint
      • Punk in Drublic: Herb Reath Stinks
  • Take That!: "Kill Rock Stars" was a very incensed take at Kathleen Hanna, written after she criticized the band earlier on. Kathleen responded by including a few lines mocking the lyrics to NOFX's "Linoleum" in "Deceptacon", a song by her next project Le Tigre. Much later, NOFX's "Linewleum" would include a backhanded compliment about "Deceptacon" being "the best Le Tigre song".
    • "Woah on the Woahs" contains a very light-hearted jab at AFI and The Offspring for their overuse of the titular word.
  • This Is a Song: "Please Play This Song On The Radio"
  • Three Chords and the Truth: Very often, though much like labelmates Lagwagon and Strung Out they've taken on deceptively complex melodies and chord progressions from time to time.
  • Too Dumb to Live: We threw gasoline on the fire and now we have stumps for arms and no eyebrows.

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