George Van Orsdel - 1980s

1980s

In the early-mid 1980s, the Miami punk scene barely existed, for all but a handful of bands. He started a band around 1986, called N.R.K. (which was an acronym for the word anarchy), and then later the name was changed to The Accused (not the famous The Accused, they had selected this name before realizing there was a band by that same name already). The band was very heavily influenced by the old school punk bands, Dead Kennedys, Black Flag, etc. That was his first real punk band, and he was playing drums. That didn't last long. Shortly after, he started playing bass and singing in Not Dead Yet (1986–88), one of Miami's first prominent hardcore punk bands. Not Dead Yet, along with other local bands such as Chocolate Grasshopper, FWA and Cultural Brain Rot, helped establish the Miami punk scene back then. Not Dead Yet was influenced by bands such as Agnostic Front, Youth of Today, 7 Seconds, G.B.H., and many others.

After a couple of years and Not Dead Yet had run its course, he joined the south Florida based F-Boyz (who later went on to form Hickey in San Francisco) during 1988-1989. He now was playing drums. The F-Boyz were known for their insane stage antics and their own brand of what he liked to call "punk mock n roll" (punk rock, with a very tongue-in-cheek take on the genre, basically poking fun at anything and everything). They were very heavily influenced by bands such as The Meatmen, Stevie Stiletto, The Misfits, Elvis Presley and even Kiss. The F-Boyz (later changing their name to Fuckboyz) eventually moved to San Francisco from south Florida, where the band continued to play shows, then late 1989 due to differences, he left the band and came back to Miami.