A Sublime History: Looking Back on What Happened to One of the Best Ska Punk Bands of the 90s

By Lenni Rosenblum Fri., Jan. 13 2012 at 2:00 PM

Categories: Open Thread

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Despite what it does for your record sales, it sucks when a rockstar dies before his time. Hard times came about in 1996 after the passing of Sublime's vocalist and guitarist Bradley Nowell.

Even good ol' Lou Dog was bummin'.

Frankly, I can't blame him. If I had been more than six years old at the time, I would have been bummed too.

In honor of 40 oz. to Freedom's upcoming show at The Compound Grill on Wednesday, January 18, let's look back at Sublime's legacy, post-Bradley Nowell.

The Sublime dynasty has gone through quite a few changes since Nowell's untimely death. Remaining members Eric Wilson and Bud Gaugh got involved in some side projects to keep some of the musical spirit alive.

Eric and Bud teamed up with eight other dudes to form Long Beach Dub Allstars, but that group fell apart after band members broke a vow to give up hard drugs. That led Bud to join Eyes Adrift with Phoenix's own Curt Kirkwood of the Meat Puppets and Nirvana's Krist Novoselic. Bud and Curt later formed Volcano. Meanwhile, Eric started up Long Beach Shortbus.

Then Eric and Bud got back together to continue Sublime with Rome Ramirez, but ran into some legal issues with using the band's original name. After getting the runaround from Nowell's estate, they renamed themselves Sublime with Rome and signed to Fueled by Ramen. They've been touring with Rome since 2009 and released an album entitled Yours Truly, which is better than you might expect.

So what's the band up to now? As he announced at KROQ's Almost Acoustic Christmas show last month, it turns out that Bud is on hiatus to raise his new kid. Our best wishes go out to Bud. In the meantime, Josh Freese will apparently be filling in temporarily.

To optimally soothe your nostalgia for now, check out 40 oz to Freedom's gig next week.

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