[1] Founding bassist Steve Soto was the sole constant member of the band since its inception until his 2018 death, with singer Tony Reflex being in the group for all but one album.

During the 1980s the band went through several lineup changes, breakups, and reunions, most involving drummer Casey Royer and guitarist brothers Rikk, Frank, and Alfie Agnew.

Soto and Reflex have been the band's only constant members and primary songwriters since then, anchoring lineups that have released five more studio albums: The Fastest Kid Alive (2011), Presumed Insolent (2013), La Vendetta... (2014), Manifest Density (2016) and Cropduster (2018).

Prior to forming the Adolescents, the early band members were part of various formative punk rock groups in Fullerton, California during their teenage years in the late 1970s: Guitarist Rikk Agnew and drummer Casey Royer had played in the Detours and with Agnew's younger brother Frank in the early lineup of Social Distortion, while bassist Steve Soto was a founding member of Agent Orange.

[5] Soto thought Brandenburg would make a good singer, and suggested this to Rikk Agnew, who at the time used the stage name General Hospital (after the television show).

[2] Soto later recalled "John was more concerned with acting like Johnny Thunders instead of playing like him, and Pan refused to shave his sorry excuse of a teenage mustache.

[2][5][8] The Adolescents provided a recording of "Amoeba" which became a hit on KROQ that December; Posh Boy owner Robbie Fields presented them with gold singles for the track at a show at the Starwood in West Hollywood in early 1981, and the label later released this version of the song as a single in 1990 and included as a soundtrack for Sony PlayStation Tony Hawk's Pro Skater video game.

"We had been banned from every club in Hollywood that could hold us—the Starwood, the Roxy, and the Whisky—and a lot of people wouldn't go to Pasadena (Perkins Palace) or East L.A. (The Vex) to see us".

[2][5] He was replaced by Royer's roommate, Steve Roberts, and in July the new lineup recorded a three-song EP, Welcome to Reality, produced by Thom Wilson.

[1] The Blue Album lineup of the Adolescents (Brandenburg, now using the stage name Tony Montana; Soto; Royer; and Rikk and Frank Agnew) played a reunion show in April 1986 at Fender's Ballroom in Long Beach, California which led to the band re-forming.

[17] After touring through much of the second half of 1986, Alfie Agnew left the band at the end of the year to attend college and was replaced by Dan Colburn.

[1][2] The lineup of Brandenburg, Soto, Colburn, Hanson, and Rikk Agnew toured for most of 1987, and Brats in Battalions was released that August on the group's own label, SOS Records.

[1][2] Brandenburg stated in 1989, "I was interested in other things (I had joined another band, the Flower Leperds), and the Adolescents touring cut into my school work".

[5] He went on to record three studio albums with the Flower Leperds: Dirges in the Dark (1988), Heaven's Closed (1989), and Purple Reign (1990), sometimes using the stage name Tony Adolescent.

[1] The band began working on a follow-up album[19] with the same line-up as Balboa Fun*Zone, but eventually broke up in April 1989 before it could be completed.

Soto formed the parody group Manic Hispanic in 1992 with Gabby Gaborno and other Chicano punk musicians, issuing their first album, The Menudo Incident, that year.

[1][22] He was replaced by guitarist Mike McKnight, who had played additional guitar on the Brats in Battalions track "The Liar", and Joyride continued until 1996, issuing two studio albums, Johnny Bravo (1992) and Another Month of Mondays (1994).

[26] Following the Flower Leperds, Tony Brandenburg started a new group, Sister Goddamn, who issued two albums, Portrait in Crayon (1992) and Folksongs of the Spanish Inquisition (1995).

Brandenburg and Rikk and Frank Agnew joined other Southern California punk musicians including Bruce Duff (of 45 Grave, Twisted Roots, Sister Goddamn, and several Jeff Dahl projects), Jonny Wickersham, and Warner Young for Pinups, an album of cover versions of punk rock songs from the 1970s and early 1980s on which Soto sang backing vocals alongside Dave Naz (of the Chemical People, Down by Law, and the Last) and Rik L. Rik (of F-Word!

Royer was addicted to heroin, while Agnew abused a variety of drugs and drank alcohol excessively throughout the 1990s and early 2000s, becoming obese in the process.

[29] Brandenburg continued ADZ with other members, issuing two more albums during the 1990s: 1995's Piper at the Gates of Downey (with Frank Agnew playing lead guitar on five tracks) and 1998's Transmissions from Planet Speedball.

[7] Over the next few years the band played sporadically, including opening for Bad Religion at a benefit for Flipside and a headlining slot at Los Angeles' Galaxy Theater.

's Caseyology in 2002, Reflex did one more studio album with ADZ, 2002's American Steel, while Soto did two more with Manic Hispanic, The Recline of Mexican Civilization (2001) and Mijo Goes to Jr. College (2003).

in 2003, limited to 100 copies and consisting of six new songs: "Hawks and Doves", "Where the Children Play", "California Son", "OC Confidential", "Pointless Teenage Anthem", and "Within These Walls".

The Adolescents decided to continue as a quartet, re-recording the new songs they had done with Rikk and recording several more for their comeback album, OC Confidential (2005), which ultimately took over two years to complete.

Rotating through as the band's live guitarists over the next few years were Matt Beld, Joe Harrison, and Soto's former Joyride bandmate Mike McKnight.

Reflex and Soto became the band's sole constant members and primary songwriters from this point forward, and signed the Adolescents to German label Concrete Jungle Records.

[33] Dan Root took Harrison's guitar position in 2010, and the Adolescents released the American Dogs in Europe EP in conjunction with a European tour.

Del Rio was replaced by Mike Cambra, and McKnight by Leroy Merlin, for 2014's La Vendetta..., which was given a North American release the following year by Frontier Records.

On June 27, 2018, bassist and founding member Steve Soto died at the age of 54, days after completing an East coast tour with the band.