Brad Nowell, Bud Gaugh and Eric Wilson formed Sublime in 1988. The crew started playing
backyard parties in Long Beach, California and selling cassettes, and eventually grew
to become one of the most popular bands in America. This is Sublime's tragic real story.
The band Sublime rose to popularity in the early 1990s amid the grunge scene. But instead
of the grungy Seattle sound of heavy guitar and screaming frontmen fueled by gen-X angst,
Sublime's "breezy Cali-reggae-punk," as described by Pitchfork, sounded more like dudes having
a good time — and we were all invited to the party.
"We grew up on the alley living across from each other. And, uh, started playing music
when we were about 12, I guess."
The band formed in 1988 and landed their first official gig at a club on July 4th of that
year. By 1989 Brad Nowell joined Miguel Happoldt in launching Skunk Records, the label that
would release Sublime's first single in 1991, "Date Rape," and several of the band's subsequent
records.
"We wanted to make a record so we saved up our money. We're all hard workers."
In June 1992, Sublime released their iconic album, 40 oz. to Freedom on the label. But
even though 40 oz. to Freedom eventually nestled itself firmly into the music collection of
many a Gen-Xer and Millennial, it didn't reach the height of its popularity until after the
death of frontman Nowell, who died of a heroin overdose on May 25, 1996. Tragically, Nowell,
who was just 28, left behind a new wife and baby boy.
Nowell's son, Jakob, was born on June 25, 1995. Adding to the sadness of the situation
was that Nowell had just married the mother of his son, Troy Dendekker, on May 18, a week
prior to his death. But as Dendekker told CBS Los Angeles, by then, Nowell's drug use
was a serious problem that she didn't think he was going to be able to overcome. Dendekker
told the outlet,
"It got to a point where the boys were sick of babysitting him because of the addiction.
I got the same way and he needed to fight for it himself. [...] I don't think Bradley
would've made it no matter what because he was tired and he wasn't a fighter."
Dendekker wasn't alone in her feeling that Nowell was going to die as a result of his
addiction. According to Pitchfork, drummer Bud Gaugh said of Nowell's death,
"It wasn't a question of was it going to happen, it was a question of when it was going to
happen."
As Nowell's partying escalated into hard drug addiction, the band continued to release music
and tour. In 1993 Sublime released "Badfish," a song from 40 oz. to Freedom, as a single,
and in 1994 they released the album Robbin' the Hood. The record did well on college radio
initially, according to all music, but never reached the commercial status that 40 oz to
Freedom or Sublime's 1996 self-titled album would ultimately achieve. Sublime was released
in July 1996, two months after Nowell's death.
Nowell's addictions may have been growing, but he was still making it as a musician and
trying to be a father and husband.
In the final months of Nowell's life, he, Gaugh and Wilson were busy cutting the album
Sublime in Austin, Texas at Willie Nelson's Pedernales Studio. But according to Rolling
Stone, it was clear in those months that even though Nowell had tried to kick his heroin
habit a few times, he was worse than ever. Paul Leary of the Butthole Surfers produced
the album. He told Rolling Stone,
"They're the sweetest bunch of guys, [but] it was chaos in the studio. There were times
where someone had to go into the bathroom to see if Brad was still alive."
At one point Leary sent Nowell home to get it together. The Sublime recordings lasted
from February to May 1996, when Nowell was found dead in the Oceanview Motel in San Francisco.
Rock and Roll Roadmap reported that the singer was cremated and his ashes released in his
favorite place to surf in Surfside, California.
In the years after Nowell's death, Gaugh and Wilson put out two albums as the Long Beach
Dub All Stars, before bringing guitarist and singer Rome Ramirez into the group in 2009
and re-naming the band Sublime with Rome. By 2011 Gaugh quit the band and drummer Josh
Freese filled the opening. Freese left to play with Sting in 2017, and in 2019 Carlos
Verdugo of the San Diego reggae unit Tribal Seeds joined the group.
In an interview with Vulture, Wilson said that even though fans came out wanting to
hear original Sublime songs in the beginning, this new Sublime was different. Wilson told
told the outlet:
"We're not Sublime. We're Sublime with Rome. My favorite part of the show is when we're
out there playing our new songs, and people already know the lyrics. We're doing something
there."
It's been nearly 25 years since Nowell died, but the songs he recorded with Sublime — "Santeria,"
"Badfish," "What I got" — still get regular play on rock radio. The butter-voiced singer's
playfully comical lyrics left their mark on generations of music fans.
The Nowell family is trying to honor Bradley's memory by helping others in the music community
who are struggling with addiction. They created The Nowell Family Foundation, which is working
to open a six-bed addiction recovery center called Bradley's House for people in the music
industry who need help with substance abuse, and according to New Noise, the treatment
would be free.
To help fund the venture, in 2020 the foundation teamed up with LAW records and 24 bands to
release an acoustic Sublime tribute album called The House That Bradley Built. And in
February 2021, in honor of what would've been Brad Nowell's 53rd birthday, 20 bands participated
in a streaming concert to benefit the foundation. In August 2020 Brad's sister, Kellie Nowell,
told New Noise,
"We want to honor his memory and help other families avoid all the pain we've had to go
through. [...] We've seen the challenges that musicians face in trying to get clean and
stay clean — we thought this would be a good way to do that."