OFF! was a Los Angeles hardcore supergroup that started back in 2009 as a consequence of a then possible Circle Jerks reunion album falling apart. Kismet is what I would call it. As it happened to be ex Burning Brides guitarist and songwriter Dimitri Coats (who was supposed to produce the reunion album) and legendary hardcore punk frontman and songwriter Keith Morris (Black Flag & Circle Jerks) had been writing songs together. Then the lightbulb above their heads shined bright with the thought “We should start a band together.”

They rounded out the band with a rhythm section with bassist and Redd Kross founding member Steven McDonald who also happened to leave OFF! In 2021 to join legendary sludge metal greats The Melvins who he is still a member of to this day. Drummer of Rocket To The Crypt, Hot Snakes, and Earthless (just to name a few) Mario Rubalcaba became the bands heart, he left for a couple years in 2021 but joined again when the decision to end the band was made. Steven Mcdonald was replaced by longtime …And You Will Know Us By The Trail of Dead bassist Autry Fulbright II in 2021 this is the same time that Mario Rubalcaba left and was shortly replaced by Thundercat drummer Justin Brown.

In early May of this year the band announced that they will be doing three final shows in America coinciding with the release of their independent midnight movie that just so happens to have the same name as their final album, Free LSD. (Check out if there are screenings near you here or preorder it at the same place). The shows were to take place in Chicago, New York City, and of course finally the bands hometown Los Angeles. The band curated different openers for each show. For Chicago the original opener was supposed to be legendary noise rockers Shellac by not long after the shows were announced the untimely death of punk rock icon and Shellac frontman Steve Albini was announced so they were replaced by local noise rockers FACS. New York got to see prolific Canadan hardcore gods Fucked Up. Finally, in Los Angeles were hardcore New York upandcomers Surfbort (yes , their name is a Beyonce reference).

Surfbort are a band that I have been lucky enough to see before when they opened for IDLES (who I reviewed recently) right before the pandemic at Koreatown’s Wiltern Theater. They were then one of the best punk rock openers I have seen then and they were that night before OFF!. Frontwoman Dani Miller owns the stage and mike more confidently than ive seen from lead singers who have been front and center stage for twenty plus years. Their three guitar attack pummeled and pushed an already pretty enthused crowd to give over their energy to the band and start a circle pit that threatened to encompass the whole room. The band played several new songs that sounded like they were pretty much ready to record with a scattering of older songs and a cover of The Hollywood Squares “Hillside Strangler”. Hopefully they record their new album soon, people have been waiting since 2021 for some more and I think we need it.

OFF! does not seem to have their own stage techs so once The Belasco’s stage crew and Surfbort cleared the stage OFF! came out to do their last minute set ups. Keith Morris tapped down the band’s setlists around the stage while looking like a punk rock Moses with his scrolls. The band seems to walk off stage for not even a couple minutes before a free jazz psych out cacophony of noise started while the lights went black. Dimitri had a white folding table packed and stacked with guitar pedals adding big wooshes and walls of fuzz while the rhythm section seemed to make as much noise as they could while letting a guest saxophonist do their best Pharoah Sanders (rest in power). Then stopping like a car crash and going right into their latest record Free LSD in full with expanded and expansive jazz noise spoken word pieces about fucked up modern life spread out throughtout the tracklist before getting into tracks from their early discography mostly encompassing tracked from their First Four EPs compilation that showed them to the world at large in the first place.

I was lucky enough to see OFF! Back at Coachella 2011 and what I got to witness this past Friday night was a band who got to grow and solidify into a unit. Morris walked around the stage with urgency but also with a calm that only a person with 50ish years of practice could. Never missing a line or a moment to make a connection with the crowd. Thanking them for all of their years of support. Their last song was “Poison City” and with a wave and no encore OFF! Was no more. Thank you for everything dudes, it was an amazing time and I cannot wait to see what happens next. Maybe we'll finally get that Circle Jerks reunion album since they've been back together for a few years now.

Review & Photos by: Ben LaCross

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OFF! Tear Through Their Final Show at Los Angeles' The Belasco