With their eclectic mix of punk, reggae, ska, and hip-hop, the Long Beach, California trio Sublime became one of the most beloved bands of the ‘90s. Singer/guitarist Bradley Nowell, bassist Eric Wilson, and drummer Bud Gaugh’s original run together only lasted eight years before Nowell’s tragic overdose death, but the three albums they recorded together have since sold over 17 million copies.
In June, Sublime will release Until the Sun Explodes, the band’s first new studio album in 30 years, with Bradley’s son Jakob Nowell now in the band. And in November, the band will set off from Miami to the Bahamas for Sublime’s Reef Madness cruise. As the ultimate Sublime fan experience, the cruise’s four nights of music will include two Sublime sets as well as performances from friends like Yelawolf, G. Love, and the Long Beach Dub Allstars. If you love Sublime, here’s a look back at 10 of the most important moments in the band’s history as you prepare to set sail with the Reef Madness cruise.
10. The George Gershwin estate signs off on “Doin’ Time,” with conditions
When Sublime sampled Herbie Mann’s arrangement “Summertime” from Porgy and Bess, Bradley Nowell tweaked George Gershwin’s lyrics, singing “Doin’ time and the living’s easy” instead of the original “Summertime and the living’s easy.” Gershwin’s estate approved the use of the sample under the condition that the original line be sung on Sublime track. With Nowell having died shortly after the recording of the song, Sublime’s longtime manager Michael “Miguel” Happoldt sang the word “summertime” on the album version of “Doin’ Time” that the fourth single from Sublime’s 1996 self-titled album. A deluxe 10th anniversary edition of Sublime was released in 2006, including the earlier mix of “Doin’ Time” with Nowell singing the chorus as he’d intended.
9. A childhood vacation makes Bradley Nowell a reggae fanatic
Bradley Nowell grew up in a musical household, with a father who played guitar and a mother who played piano. But, as Sublime’s episode of VH1’s Behind the Music revealed, it was a fortuitous 1979 vacation, with an 11-year-old Nowell accompanying his father on a sailing trip to the Virgin Islands, that first exposed him to reggae music, which became an enormous influence on Sublime.
8. Eric Wilson takes a rare lead vocal on “Live at E’s”
Bassist Eric Wilson has been the only consistent member of every iteration of Sublime since the band’s formation in 1988. But the only time you can hear his voice loud and clear in the band’s catalog is on “Live at E’s,” the track that closed the band’s 1991 demo tape Jah Won’t Pay the Bills before appearing on their proper debut album, 1992’s 40oz. To Freedom. Longtime Sublime collaborator Marshall “Ras MG” Goodman, famously referenced on “Doin’ Time,” played drums on the song and traded rhymes with Nowell before they tried to include Wilson in the freestyle session. Wilson just briefly spits a few bars about his discomfort with rapping before passing the mic back to his bandmates: “My name is Eric, I have nothing to say/ ‘Cause I am not a fucking DJ.”
7. Opie Ortiz defines Sublime’s visual aesthetic
Long Beach tattooist and mural artist Opie Ortiz was an early friend of Sublime whose work graced the covers of the band’s two most popular releases. The burning sun on the cover of 40 oz. to Freedom epitomizes Ortiz’s style, which incorporates influences from graffiti, the pop art movement, and Aztec mythology. And Ortiz tattooed the band’s name on Nowell’s back in 1995, a photograph of which adorned the band’s 1996 self-titled album. Ortiz also made an appearance on drums on the band’s 1994 album Robbin’ the Hood, and was later bandmates with Wilson and Gaugh in the Long Beach Dub All Stars. Passengers on the Reef Madness cruise will even have the opportunity to get a tattoo by Ortiz.
6. Sublime’s first gig
Gaugh and Wilson had been childhood friends, and played in a punk band together called The Juice Bros. as teenagers. But it wasn’t until they met Nowell in the late ‘80s that they became Sublime and incorporated reggae and ska into their sound under his influence. Sublime’s debut was on America’s birthday, with the trio playing their first show on July 4th, 1988 in their hometown Long Beach.
5. 40oz. to Freedom becomes a sleeper hit
When Sublime’s indie label Skunk Records released 40oz. to Freedom in June 1992, the album didn’t even chart. But the album became a word-of-mouth sensation over the next few years, selling more and more even after the band released a follow-up album, Robbin’ the Hood, in 1994. After the 40oz. track “Date Rape” became one of the most requested songs on the stalwart California alternative station KROQ, Sublime shot a video for “Date Rape” in March 1995 and got its first taste of radio airplay. Over the following years, “Badfish” and the cover of “Smoke Two Joints” by The Toyes also became radio staples, and today 40oz. to Freedom is double platinum.
4. Sublime’s musical heroes make cameos in the “Wrong Way” video
Sublime saluted many of their influences on 40 oz. To Freedom, particularly other eclectic, energetic southern California bands like San Pedro’s The Minutemen and L.A.’s Fishbone. Songs on Sublime’s debut album sampled two songs from The Minutemen’s 1984 classic Double Nickels on the Dime, and interpolated the Fishbone single “Party at Ground Zero.” Years later, Minutemen bassist Mike Watt and Fishbone frontman Angelo Moore returned the love, making cameos in the 1997 video for Sublime’s hit “Wrong Way.” And in 2025, both Watt and Fishbone covered Sublime tracks for the compilation Look At All The Love We Found: A Tribute To Sublime.
3. Sublime returns as a family affair
Bradley Nowell and Troy Dendekker had one child together, Jakob, in June 1995. And while Jakob Nowell lost his father very early in life, he grew up to love Sublime’s music and eventually sing and play guitar. And in 2023, Jakob performed with Gaugh and Wilson for the first time at a benefit show for H.R. of Bad Brains, officially becoming a member of the band for a performance at Coachella in 2024. Sublime’s first single with Jakob on lead vocals, “Ensenada,” became the band’s first number one single on alternative radio since “What I Got.”
2. Bradley Nowell and Gwen Stefani duet
Sublime and their Anaheim contemporaries No Doubt exploded into the mainstream around the same time during the mid-‘90s rise of ska punk. Both bands had crossed paths well before that, though, with collaborations on earlier indie releases. No Doubt frontwoman Gwen Stefani guested on Sublime’s 1994 song “Saw Red,” and a year later Nowell and Stefani sang together again on No Doubt’s “Total Hate ’95” from No Doubt’s self-released The Beacon Street Collection. “His voice is like candy to your ears,” Stefani told the Los Angeles Times after Nowell’s death in 1996.
1. The bittersweet triumph of Sublime’s self-titled album
Sublime were on the rise with the success of “Date Rape” when Nowell died in May 1996, but nobody could have expected how popular the band would become in the months ahead. Sublime’s self-titled album, released two months later in July, was an instant hit, with “What I Got,” “Santeria,” and “Wrong Way” all becoming top 3 hits on alternative radio. SPIN named Sublime the 8th best album of 1996, and it was eventually certified platinum five times over, securing Bradley Nowell’s musical legacy even if he sadly never lived to see it himself. And one of the band’s two Reef Madness sets will be a performance of the entire Sublime album from front to back to celebrate its 30th anniversary.