Offenders - Fight Back (Bitzcore, 1981/1989)

Since the other Offenders material has recently been reissued on Southern Lord, I thought I'd add the final piece of recorded material from them.

The Offenders' 2 albums are right up there with fellow Texans DRI and MDC in terms of ferocity and technicality. If you enjoy the thick basslines on Dealing With It, then you're enjoying the Offenders' own Mikey "Offender" Donaldson. And to come full Texas circle, he also played in a recent incarnation of MDC before dying in a Barcelona squat a few years ago. I'm curious if it's the squat that was recently demolished nearby.

The fact that they didn't tour as voraciously as DRI and MDC probably kept them from being appreciated for so many years. It's not for a lack of reissues though. Their albums have been reissued in various formats about 4 times before the recent ones, most of the time omitting this 7".

Fight Back was released by Bitzcore in the late 80's and combines their first 7", Lost Causes, and 3 more songs recorded during that period. This 7" contains the only material with their original singer, and their music at the time wasn't quite as hardcore as it became on their next release, the We Must Rebel LP. While not as "classic" as their other stuff, this is still a great punk EP, closer to early SoCal punk, or even The Clash on the last 2 songs. But it still features Mikey's trademark bass tone, some catchy tunes and an early version of one their classics, "I Hate Myself."

I took this from the Bitzcore CD version of We Must Rebel, remastered it a bit and took out a couple weird noises on one of the songs.

They also have a demo from 1983 that was included on the Died In Custody reissue on GTA Records. I believe that's out of print at this point, so if anyone needs that, let me know.

Offenders - Fight Back (R) (vbr 0)