Ep531: Erik "Smelly" Sandin of NOFX
The Vinyl Guide - Artist Interviews for Record Collectors and Music Nerds
Nate Goyer
4.7 • 579 Ratings
🗓️ 12 January 2026
⏱️ 42 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Erik "Smelly" Sandin discusses NOFX life after touring, new music, sobriety through the NOFX hurricane, the Las Vegas incident controversy, the upcoming NOFX Retrospective at the Punk Rock Museum and more.
Topics Include:
- NOFX didn't break up, just stopped touring, still recording new music together
- Band recorded 6-7 new songs three months ago in the studio
- Mike constantly writes new material, has lots of unreleased songs ready
- January 16-18 NOFX retrospective exhibit opening at Las Vegas Punk Rock Museum
- Smelly will give personal tours but doesn't know what artifacts they'll display
- Never kept any memorabilia from 42 years, always gave everything away immediately
- Shocked that original PMRC records now sell for $5,000+ on collector market
- Band relationships remain same, they talk regularly but need space between tours
- Currently playing drums with Randy from Pennywise, Cameron Webb
- Fills in with the Vandals when Josh Freese tours with other bands
- Recorded drums on Vandals' Christmas album 30 years ago, including transgender song
- Early drug experimentation began with acid at 16, escalated quickly into addiction
- Became homeless junkie living on streets for years during darkest period
- Got clean in 1992, has maintained sobriety for over 30 years now
- Joined NOFX through classified ad, instant chemistry with Mike during first jam
- Band went through multiple lineup changes before finding the classic NOFX formula
- Fascinated by ancient mysteries like underground Turkish cities, pre-Incan megalithic structures
- Favorite museum artifact: Joe Strummer's original "London Calling" lyrics with water stains
- His museum tour focuses on how punk rock saved his life story
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome to the Vinyl Guide, the podcast for record collectors and music nerds. |
| 0:10.1 | Here's your host, the biggest record nerd of them all, Nate Goyer. |
| 0:13.5 | Hello, everyone, it's Nate. |
| 0:15.8 | Welcome to episode 531 of the Vinyl Guide, the podcast for record collectors and music nerds. |
| 0:22.8 | And ladies and gentlemen, today I'm going to get right into it because I really enjoyed this |
| 0:27.0 | conversation. I hope you do too. It's with Smelly, Eric Smelly Sandin of No Effects, |
| 0:34.0 | and we cover a wide range of topics. Now, if you're at all familiar with no effects you'll |
| 0:39.0 | know smelly doesn't shy away from covering topics he's rarely short of words today's chat is no |
| 0:45.5 | different we talk all about what happened with no effects leading up and directly after the final |
| 0:51.2 | shows we talk about what life and relationships are like with the band now. |
| 0:56.0 | What's coming up? We talk no effects memorabilia, new material. We discuss the impact of the Las Vegas |
| 1:03.0 | incident and controversy. Of course, when they were canceled for some time. God, I hate that word. |
| 1:08.1 | We discuss the punk rock museum and the upcoming No Effects retrospective, January 16th through 18th at the punk rock museum in Las Vegas. |
| 1:18.7 | If you got any opportunity, go there, enjoy, be fascinated with everything that's in that building. |
| 1:24.1 | And you get to meet the band, enjoy the Q&A roundtable. |
| 1:29.7 | Physical copies of the new No FX quarter album will be there, and way, way more. |
| 1:33.5 | It's the mecca in the desert, the punk rock museum, Google it up for tickets and enjoy. |
| 1:39.2 | Oh, and real quick, if you celebrate No Effects, we do here on the show quite a bit. |
| 1:45.3 | Other episodes and interviews you may like are episode 432 with Eric Melvin, episodes |
| 1:51.3 | 428 and 51 with Fat Mike. |
| 1:55.4 | Plus, we have hundreds of other episodes and interviews available with the likes of Mike |
| 1:59.5 | Watt, Bootsie Collins, |
... |
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