Everybody in the punk scene knows who Fat Mike is. If you spend anytime at all reading punk blogs, twitter or facebook you probably even know a decent amount about the NOFX front-man / Fat Wreck Chords founder’s personal life. We thought it would be fun, however, to test the extent of your trivial knowledge by putting together a list of 10 things most people probably don’t know about Fat Mike.
Test your knowledge here.
1. Mike has made many guest appearances on songs by other punk bands. He played guitar on “No Brainer” by Bracket, sang on Lagwagon’s songs “Lazy” and “Mr. Coffee,” played bass on “Unpopular Again” by Swingin’ Utters, and lent his voice to a couple seconds of Screeching Weasel’s “Peter Brady.”
2. Prior to the formation of NOFX, Mike was in a band called False Alarm, in which he was known as “Misfit Mike.”
3. Fat Mike’s ex-wife is vice president of Fat Wreck Chords. The two still remain close friends.
4. He founded the Rock Against Bush tour and Punk Voter in an effort to keep George W. Bush from being re-elected in 2004.
5. Mike coined the phrases “nawesome,” which means not awesome, and “greediocracy” – a term used to describe an aristocracy where money rules, rather than nobility.
6. He has been the owner of a gastropub-style restaurant in Brooklyn, New York, called Thistle Hill Tavern since 2010.
7. Mike was a student at San Francisco State, where he graduated in 1990 with a bachelor’s degree in Social Science and a minor in Human Sexuality.
8. Mike’s favorite move is “Hedwig And The Angry Inch“.
9. He has a strict policy of not releasing recordings by emo or religious bands on Fat Wreck Chords, except for MxPx, who promised not to put any songs about God on their 2001 EP “The Renaissance”.
10. Being the avid BDSM fan he is, Mike has had a dungeon in every one of his houses since 1992.