Can The Offspring be cool again?

1994. Nirvana, Soundgarden, Alice in Chains dominated the airwaves. But in a year when grunge dominated, punk became cool again.

Every time "Basket Case" by Green Day was played on MuchMusic, I was glued to the t.v. set. I bought "Dookie" and loved it. At the same time that the Berkeley punkers blew up, a group of Orange County boys released their second Epitaph album, "Smash". "Come Out and Play", "Self Esteem" and "Gotta Get Away" made me feel cool by just listening to it. When the rest of my public school classmates listened to whatever was on the radio, I felt like I was a part of something cool that was happening. And the best part was that none of them knew what was going on.

Dexter Holland didn't look like Kurt Cobain or Eddie Vedder. He wore long braids and didn't seem to have the "life if so hard, poor me" mentality. The video for "Come Out and Play" had crazy orange tints and was all over the place. Unlike many of the grunge dudes, it didn't seem like any of The Offspring members were about to cram needles in their veins. They were cool without having to act like they were cool.



When they had a big fallout with Epitaph, they jumped over to Columbia Records, and if you didn't like it, too bad. "Ixnay on the Ombray" was released, and for the most part, it was straight-ahead classic Offspring punk. Songs like "All I Want" pretty much said "I'm gonna do what I wanna do, screw off". When I was 16, I loved it. I'm 23, and with the puny amount of maturity that has taken place, I still love it! In all seriousness, it can still be played with NOFX or Pennywise, and is just as "punk" (whatever that means anymore).



A few albums later, they released "Splinter", and I almost puked. Boring, repetitive, clearly lacking the effort they've put towards previous albums. And The Offspring have announced a release date for their follow-up to "Splinter". Bob Rock produced the record, and for a man whose been involved in such punk rock classics as Bon Jovi's "Slippery When Wet" and Metallica's "St. Anger", I'd be disappointed if the album wasn't at least a partial return to classic Offspring. Okay, so maybe those other Bob Rock albums were a guitar slide or two away from punk rock, but still, Bob should be able to produce at least a half-good album with all the success he's had in his career. Well, here's to hoping.