NOFXfrontman Mike Burkett said that next year “will be the last year” for the San Francisco punk band on Thursday, Sept. 1. The singer and bassist, known asFat Miketo his legion of fans, dropped thenews in a reply to an unrelatedInstagram postabout getting a haircut in Alaska.
Asked why the band doesn’t tour in Canada more often, the Fat Wreck Chords boss casually replied, “Actually, we love Canada, it’s just that next year will be our last year. We will be announcing our final shows soon. It’s been an amazing run …”
Adding insult to injury, in a separate comment Burkett said the band’s final show will not take place inits hometown.
“Los Angeles will be the last place we play,” he said. “It’s where we started, it’s where we’ll end.”
WhileBurkett formed NOFX with guitarist Eric Melvin and drummer Erik Sandin in 1983, when they were all just 16 growing up in Los Angeles, he moved north two years later to attend San Francisco State University.The original lineup — along with second guitarist and trumpet player Aaron “El Hefe” Abeyta, who joined in 1991— more or less stayed intact as the bandflourished in the Bay Area and became ingrained in the local punk scene for more than two decades.
The band sold more than 16 million albums, all without the help of a major label, before Burkett and his family returned to Southern California in 2009.
Theannounced split comes just as the band marks its 40th anniversary, and a year after NOFX released its latest full-length recording, “Single Album.”
Then again,NOFX has a history of self-sabotage.
Sandin temporarily quit the band due to substance abuse in 1992, the year NOFX released its breakthroughalbum, “White Trash, Two Heebs and a Bean.” The cover art for the group’s 1996 album, “Heavy Petting Zoo,” meanwhile, featured a painting depicting bestiality.
At the band’s 2010 Southby Southwest Festival set, with Burkett performing as his alter-egoCokie the Clown, NOFX debuted a song called “Drinking Pee,” while the singer appeared to relieve himself into a Patron bottle and then distribute shots of urine to fans.
The band alsocaused a stir whenBurkett made controversial commentsfollowing the fatal shooting in Las Vegas at the Route 91 Harvest Festival in 2017, for which he later posted an apology to NOFX’sFacebook page.
“I can’t sleep, no one in my band can,” he said. “What we said in Vegas was s—ty and insensitive and we are all embarrassed by our remarks. So we decided we will all get together to discuss and write an in-depth, sincere, and honest apology because that’s what the people we offended and hurt deserve.”