It’s not unusual to see Bud Gaugh’s young daughter bopping along with the music stage right, wearing headphones during a Sublime with Rome concert. “It’s totally a different world touring now than before and with the responsibilities,” Gaugh says. “It’s a blessing to be coherent and responsible.”
A couple of weeks ago I interviewed the remaining members of Sublime and their new singer, Rome Ramirez. Their debauchery and recklessness before and after singer Bradley Nowell's heroin overdose are legendary.
These days, Wilson is more pragmatic, approaching the band as a business. “We’re not a fiasco like we used to be,” Wilson says. “I’m not really into sleeping on people’s floors, you know? But as far as the music, we sound a lot like we did back then.”
“I didn’t really grieve properly after Brad’s death,” Gaugh agrees. “It took some time to do it." Nearly two decades and 12 or so steps.
Nowell's sneakers were not easy to fill, and some people would like to see the band only in their memory. But for many, they never even got to see Sublime because by the time the band's big breakthrough happened, Nowell was gone.
Gaugh faces the criticism head on. When a sound guy he worked with through his band Del Mar expressed reluctance to give Sublime with Rome a chance, Gaugh listened. The guy told Gaugh straight out that he felt replacing Nowell was wrong.
“I told him, ‘Well, I just want you to follow the music,’” Gaugh recalls. He convinced Soundman to give it a shot before passing judgment, giving him a ticket to a show and a promise that afterward they would discuss it reasonably. “Just let the music speak for itself,” Gaugh said.
Soundman is now a fan. “People really identify with the music,” says Gaugh, adding the songs are so iconic it's hard to retain ownership. “They cling onto it like it’s their own.” There is a sense of possession and entitlement, he says. “It’s about our lives and their lives.”
As for the reluctance of some Sublime fans, Ramirez takes it all in stride. “I could go online and read about me all day long, or I could read about Paris Hilton or Barack Obama," he says. "There is always something people are looking to talk shit about. But we’ve had a really positive momentum.”
Here the article I wrote about Sublime with Rome that came out today in the first issue of the new alternative newsweekly, City Beat Long Beach:
Sublime with Rome is still doin’ time as this city’s most famous musical exports
Other than Snoop and Dre, there aren’t many musicians or rappers who repped Long Beach as hard as Sublime during the last few decades.
Out of all five of the people on that list, only bassist Eric Wilson still resides within cabbing distance of Fern’s on Fourth Street and the neighborhoods where backyard parties spawned the “Summertime” savants.
Bradley Nowell died of a heroin overdose on May 25, 1996, in San Francisco while on tour. He was 28. With Nowell gone, the band came to an abrupt end just two months before their self-titled major label debut.
Sublime was on the brink of securing their place in KROQ flashback history with the self-titled release, the third and final full-length recording with Nowell. Sublime spawned the band’s only No. 1 hit, “What I Got.” To date, they’ve sold 17 million albums worldwide.
The band’s meteoric rise was indelibly connected to the tragedy the remaining band members faced as they grieved along with fans who were taken by Nowell’s reggae-influenced, punk-laced emotive vocals.
The fans take immense ownership of Sublime’s music that is so strongly intertwined with Nowell’s legacy. It seemed futile to continue as a band without their lead singer.
When In Rome
It wasn’t until a friend of the band came across then-20-year-old Rome Ramirez early last year, an aspiring singer-songwriter with guitar skills to boot, that the idea of reforming Sublime was even considered. The result is Sublime with Rome, made up of drummer Bud Gaugh and Wilson and “featuring” Ramirez. The “with Rome” part is sort of a big deal.
The Sublime songwriting process remains the same with Ramirez as they work on new music, sometimes coming up with parts while on stage, just like in the old days.
“So far, we basically have the same chemistry as we had with Brad,” Wilson says. “Which is a relief. That is what Sublime was: chemistry.”
Sublime’s roots run deep, sprouting from a decades-long friendship between Wilson and Gaugh, childhood friends. They formed their first punk band, the Juice Bros., with future Sublime manager Michael Happoldt.
Wilson went on to start his own project called Sloppy 2nds, which Nowell joined. Not long after, Wilson introduced Gaugh to Nowell, a recent UC Santa Cruz business major dropout who graduated from Woodrow Wilson High in the Belmont Heights area. Wilson gave Gaugh a glowing review of Nowell, enticing him to take a listen.
Click below for the full story:
They are playing at Casino Morongo the end of next month or beginning of November.
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