By Andrew Bansal
Los Angeles-based hardcore punk supergroup OFF! was founded in 2009 by longtime friends Keith Morris (Black Flag/Circle Jerks) on vocals and Dimitri Coats on guitar, and once they had recruited the services of Steven McDonald (Redd Kross) on bass and Mario Rubalcaba (Rocket From The Crypt/Hot Snakes) on drums, they went about their simple mission to release a set of songs they had already written. Five years later, they’ve just put out their third LP ‘Wasted Years’ via Vice Music and the band has become a much larger entity than they’d have ever imagined. Starting with a great record release show at Amoeba Music on April 8th, they embarked on a run of US dates to play this new material live and bring the energy of this musical style onto stages nationwide. Yesterday on May 1st, I had a detailed conversation with Dimitri Coats about all things OFF! Enjoy it below.
Dimitri, it’s good to have you on Metal Assault. First of all, OFF! has been doing quite a few shows in the past month, since the release of the new album ‘Wasted Years’. How’s everything been going for you guys?
Really good! We’re excited to play the new songs and they are going over really well live. It seems like the fans are digging the new record. So it’s an exciting time for us.
Right, and the album debuted at #67 on the billboards. That must be an amazing feeling as well.
Yeah! It’s our second album in a row where we broke the top 100. That’s pretty crazy for a punk band with a singer that’s almost 60 years old (laughs).
That’s very true. So, you’re three albums deep now but when the band started out five years ago, did you even aim to make a long-term thing?
I think we planned on just releasing a couple of 7-inches and playing a few parties in and around Los Angeles. We certainly didn’t think that we’d be traveling all around the world making a living doing it!
So is this pretty much the main focus for all four guys in the band?
Yeah. When the band started, I don’t think any of us were doing it full-time. Keith and I were pretty broke and trying to figure out something to do. We decided to make a Circle Jerks record and that didn’t work out. Mario and Steven had 9-5 jobs. So this band kind of kick-started all of our careers and now all of us are doing music full-time. So it’s pretty amazing, and a really cool accident that happened, which we are very grateful.
That’s a good way of putting it. Like you said, OFF! was born out of songs that were written for a Circle Jerks record that never happened, but with ‘Wasted Years’ and the full-length album before that, did your working process change because you were actually writing music for this band as opposed to something that was already lying around?
Yeah, I think it was different when I realized that I was going into the band just playing guitar. That changed everything, and certainly after having played live a few times, you get a sense of what you need to do to accomplish your assault as a performer. I think when Keith and I are writing songs, we imagine being in a sweaty club. The songs are tools you use when you’re in the trenches, you know (laughs), and it’s kind of like a life or death situation. It’s definitely an intense show that we put on. The crowd is physically involved, so the music has to elevate the situation.
You’re playing just the guitar as opposed to being the frontman in Burning Brides. Is this band in a way easier or more enjoyable for you?
It’s different. It’s not necessarily more enjoyable. In some ways there’s a lot more freedom and less pressure not having to front the band, but on the other hand it’s a bit limiting in terms of what I’m not able to do. I sort of compare it to being in a fast, nice sports car and then learning how to ride a motorcycle, taking off your helmet and weaving around traffic. It’s a totally different way of traveling. Right now, I’m actually on my way to go pick up Matt [Cameron] and Ben [Shepherd] from Soundgarden and we’re going to go over to Alain Johannes’ studio for a project we’ve been working on together. So, my plan is to make music with all sorts of interesting people. OFF! is definitely a very specific thing. It’s one color and there’s a certain goal we have to hit and we don’t really stray from that. It’s kind of like everything feels like being under the gun and a quick-fire challenge. There’s no freedom, we’re not Steely Dan. We take two days to record an album and we give ourselves may be a month, two months tops to write the whole thing.
The band OFF! is categorized as a supergroup because of all four members being in other bands currently or previously. That term itself has a sort of stigma to it and some people are ready to write off a supergroup straightaway. Did that ever come to your mind at all?
Yeah, I think there’s a lot of that going on and most of it is pure garbage. I think people get a bunch of all-stars together because it sort of lets you skip a couple of steps. It doesn’t mean it’s always going to be good just because all the things look good on paper. Like I said before, OFF! wasn’t a planned band. There were songs that were already written and we realized that no one was going to hear those songs unless we did something about it. Keith and I chose the rest of the band, we didn’t hold any auditions as we knew who we wanted and it just happened very fast. Keith and I were friends for years before OFF!, but I don’t really come from his world as much as people might think I do. I’m more Black Sabbath than Black Flag, and I think the reason that the band works is because they don’t know exactly what I’m doing. Because the guitar-playing is somewhat naive, it sort of fits in a way because it conveys the same kind of feeling that the guys inventing this kind of music back in the day had. They were listening to Blue Oyster Cult, Creedence Clearwater Revival and Led Zeppelin, and putting it on to a blender, expressing themselves in a more urgent, angrier way. Luckily, Keith and I still have a lot to be pissed off about.
Exactly, and that shows in the music. But in terms of supergroups, are there any that you’ve particularly liked?
(Long pause) Well, why don’t you name a few and I’ll tell you whether I like them or not?
Oh, well to be honest I haven’t enjoyed a lot of them but a few of them did catch my ear, and one was Them Crooked Vultures with John Paul Jones, Dave Grohl and Josh Homme. I don’t know what happened to them, because they haven’t done anything for the past 3 or 4 years but I saw them live and they put out one album which was great.
Yeah, like I said I’m going to be recording with Alain Johannes today, and he’s in that band as a touring member. I did not get a chance to see them live, but definitely a fan of Queens Of The Stone Age. That itself is kind of like an all-star band in a way too. That whole scene is really creative and there’s definitely a sense of family vibe and a revolving door of exceptional musicians. I’m not sure that I connected to it in the same way that I did with Queens and may be I wasn’t supposed to, but certainly I’m always interested in anything that Josh in doing.
Cool, I’m glad I brought up that band then. But obviously you’re based in LA and very much involved in the scene. How do you see it nowadays? Honestly do you find it enjoyable to play shows here?
I think it really depends. We just played the Roxy and there’s a lot of history there. Keith and Steven cut their teeth in those rooms on the Sunset Strip. But in LA I feel it’s the kind of situation where it really depends on how you present yourself. I think for the first year I booked all of our shows, I made sure they were very authentic, in warehouse spaces downtown, by some space that’s in transition, rent a PA and people show up not really knowing where they are, because I wanted to serve the music and to really create a backdrop for it. And now we’re a little bit more established, we have booking agents and people want to see us on a stage with a better PA. So we’ve slipped a little bit more into the plan that people have for most bands but what happens in those situations is that I think the crowd doesn’t react the same way. I think that we need to go back to playing non-traditional venues whenever possible, because it invites a certain kind of chaos. People let their guard down a little bit more and the crowd is more likely to go insane, jump up on the stage and freak out. An LA audience can definitely be a little jaded.
Exactly, that’s why I asked you about it. But finally, what plans does OFF! have for the coming year?
Well, we’re about to tour the East Coast. We just finished the West Coast. After that we’re going to Japan where we’ll do a couple of shows in Tokyo, which is really exciting because Keith has never been there. And then, this is pretty wild and definitely has nothing to do with the fact that I’ve been playing music with , but we’re going to open for Pearl Jam at Milton Keynes bowl which is 65,000 people in the UK. We like to do those sorts of things too. I mean, definitely my thing with this band is, Keith is one of my best friends and everything I do in this band is sort of to make sure that his last hurrah is a good one. And I think some of that has to do with the kind of extreme things he’s handled before. Certainly most people don’t get to play Milton Keynes bowl. I mean, it’s totally fucked up but if you walk on stage and play to half the bowl, you’re still playing to 30,000 people (laughs). It probably doesn’t make any sense to our fans, the same way when we got asked to play with the Red Hot Chili Peppers it bummed out a lot of people. But it doesn’t really matter to us. Flea was in the Circle Jerks for a while and we like all kinds of music. I like Elliott Smith and Mayhem’s Deathcrush too. We’re real fans of music and part of it is just to see how far we can take this thing. The fact that people are buying that records, and we’re going to be on television tonight for Last Call With Carson Daly as some of the Roxy show was filmed for it, we’ve been written up in New York Times and been on NPR, it just doesn’t really make sense for a band like us. So in a certain way we feel like we’ve thrown a wrench into the engine, somehow. And then we’re going to Europe in October and doing some other stuff in the States this year. I’m sure we’ll go back to Australia too. So yeah, just keeping busy. It’s crazy to see a whole year of your life get scheduled right before your eyes, you know (laughs). It’s turned into an occupation.
Related: Gig Review + Photos – OFF! Play Free In-Store At Amoeba Hollywood
OFF! links:
OFFofficial.com
facebook.com/OFFband
twitter.com/OFFofficial
OFF! North American tour dates:
5/7 Minneapolis, MN – Triple Rock
5/8 Chicago, IL – Bottom Lounge
5/9 Detroit, MI – Small’s Bar
5/10 Toronto, Ontario – Lee’s Palace
5/12 Asbury Park, NJ – Asbury Lanes
5/15 Baltimore, MD – Ottobar
5/16 Philadelphia, PA – First Unitarian Church
5/17 New York, NY – Bowery Ballroom
5/18 Boston, MA – Middle East
5/20 Nashville, TN – Exit/In
5/22 Houston, TX – Fitzgerald’s
5/23 Dallas, TX – Club Nada
5/24 Albuquerque, NM – Launchpad
5/26 Las Vegas, NV – Punk Rock Bowling