No strangers to the cross-pollination of musical styles & genres – Punk, Hip-Hop, Electronic, Pop – the Codefendants announced its forthcoming release Lifers, set to drop in just a few short months on April 3, 2026. The band, Sam King (Get Dead), NOFX’s Fat Mike, and Julio “Ceschi” Ramos, just released the new single as a precursor for the release, “Rivals,” which once again pairs Codefendants with legendary west coast emcee The D.O.C. The new project was produced by Fat Mike who did have some things to say about the single and the D.O.C..

“I was hanging with D.O.C. and he was telling me stories of gang life in Compton,” says Fat Mike. “I told him that there were punk gangs too. He didn’t believe me. Then I told him about FFF and LADS and Suicidals… Then he wrote his verses to ‘Rivals.‘ It’s pretty fucking awesome that the fuckin’ D.O.C. and I got to work on another song together.”

“Our second track with the legendary D.O.C stems from conversations about how punk and hip-hop are overlapping counter-cultural movements that came out of a similar time period with similar ideals,” continues Ceschi. “The D.O.C. even directly mentions the correlations and similarities in his verse while Sam and I mostly talking shit about rappers and punk / tastemaker snobbery.

“Since we started Codefendants we’ve been confronted by gatekeepers not understanding that we genuinely grew up in both of these worlds of punk and hip-hop. When Fat Mike wrote the music for this track he was directly inspired by some of the slower, sludgier punk tracks of the early ’80s.”

Meanwhile, Sam King simply states: “The fuck you want me to say? The other guys already said it all, it’s fucking Codefendants with The D.O.C., it’s fucking dope.”

Tour Dates:

February 13 – Cooly Hotel – Coolangatta Qld, Australia
February 14 – Morts Brewing Co. – Nambour, Australia
February 15 – The Brightside Brisbane – Fortitude Valley, Australia
February 19 – Café Gummo – Thornbury, Australia
February 20 – The Hotel Metro – Adelaide, Australia
February 21 – The Last Chance Rock & Roll Bar – Melbourne, Australia
April 18 – Red Rocks Amphitheatre – Morrison, CO *with Sublime
May 9 – Sublime Me Gusta Festival – Fort Worth, TX
November 15-19 – Sublime Cruise – Sailing From Miami, FL