Who is sublimes lead singer

But friends say he could never be comfortable without the drug. Perry Farrell and Kurt Cobain and all those guys did drugs, and Brad wanted to see what it was like. Then they honestly begin to think that they write better music! S ublime were a party band. They were, people will tell you, lovable, but they were also, the same people will attest, out of control. They loved to get fucked up, they loved to fuck things up, and they had many ways of doing it.

Other times, the band would party too much on the day of a major gig and squander a golden opportunity. The band has been nominated for best alternative video. Dazed in the spotlight, Gaugh performs a little jig and mumbles a few thank-yous to friends and family. But by the time he met up with Wilson the next day in New York, the bottle looked too good to save.

Wilson, clutching a jet-fueled margarita, shudders at the memory. These days, Wilson and Gaugh start most mornings with a bong hit and continue smoking well into the night. It has the feel of a college hangout, with a revolving cast of characters lounging on the couches and chairs, beer bottles covering every flat surface, bongs on the end tables and three Rottweilers that bark viciously and gnash their teeth at newcomers. Wilson and Gaugh whose families lived across an alleyway from each other, have been friends since childhood, when they first started playing music together and surfing at nearby Seal Beach.

When punk bands like the Minutemen came to town, Gaugh and Wilson were always at the edge of the stage. Wilson played trumpet for a while but says he sucked at it and switched to guitar and then bass. When he was in sixth grade, he met Nowell. The two began playing music together before Nowell took off for Santa Cruz, to start college at the University of California.

The album, which the band released on its own label, Skunk, did well on a word-of-mouth basis. Gaugh attempted to reach out to his band mate — though often in destructive ways. So I was all things that I could be to him during that time. I tried to be his conscience; I tried to be his nurse. I even tried to be his drug buddy; I mean, we got loaded together a couple of times.

Nowell met Troy in , at a Sublime show in San Diego. The prospect of signing to a major label was a big deal for Nowell, so when Sublime began talking with MCA, in , he was determined to really clean up.

She has long, blond-streaked hair and is dressed in black running shorts and a white baby tee that partially exposes a rose tattoo on her right arm. When she speaks, her voice has a coarse, cigarette-wrecked edge. Troy den Denkker was born and raised in a San Diego household where drugs and alcohol were always around.

The band combined blisteringly fast punk rock, third wave ska then at its peak popularity and dub rhythms delivered with a devil-may-care attitude. Founding Sublime members Eric Wilson and Bud Gaugh continued to produce three albums of new music under the moniker Long Beach Dub Allstars, but perhaps the most notable incarnation of Sublime is a collaboration between Wilson, Gaugh and singer and guitarist Rome Ramirez. Beginning in , the group returned to performing under the Sublime moniker, playing the same songs, with Ramirez essentially sitting in for Nowell.

Gaugh has since left the band, replaced on drums by Carlos Verdugo, formerly of the Tribal Seeds. While fans will never be able to hear Nowell belt out any of his iconic lyrics, Sublime with Rome still carries on and has a full schedule of dates booked through In those days, backend was still at 70 percent.

Tom Gaffey : Here's one of the differences that I noticed. The first couple times that they came through, they'd get here early, they'd do their soundcheck and then they'd hang out with all the skater kids. The skater kids would be going onto their RV and watching videos with them and hanging out. The last time through, the RV was not open to skaters.

They weren't hanging out as much. Bradley wasn't skating with the kids like he had before. That was the first sign that something was a little bit wrong. We had a foot school bus that we took around on tour, so we rolled up in that, and all the guys from the band hung out in there.

That was like our little backstage party zone. Hollie Simons : I remember lots of frat boys, which was weird for the Phoenix, and the crowd that usually went there. It was never the college boys, it was the punk rockers and skaters. I went with my girlfriends. Tyson Engel : Brad was hanging out with people out front. He was excited with the new record coming out. I gave him a cigarette, but I didn't really talk to him that much. Hollie Simons : I thought it was incredibly cool that before they played, Brad was in the crowd, drinking and hanging out.

Eric Wilson : I remember before the show—it was in the Bay Area, with a college crowd—and there were some guys discussing politics. I said what I thought about it, which wasn't much, and then the guy put me down for a couple minutes in a real intelligent way.

Josh Drake : The way the Phoenix used to get when there were tons of people in there, it was so hot that you had to try to crane your head up to get fresh air. With the crowd, and the heat, it was tough to breathe. Hollie Simons : It was an awesome concert, and a huge party. The energy level was just insane. Jason Boggs : Sublime killed it that night. They did a great, great job.

Considering how much we'd all been partying before the show, I was very, very impressed at how tight they sounded. Tom Gaffey : I think I read somewhere that said he'd called home, and said he was having the best show he'd ever had. I don't want to go against what common belief is, but I do recall that I was kind of bored with that show. I'm sorry to say that.

It just didn't have the energy the other shows had had. Sara Sugrue : I recall feeling sheer disappointment. I thought it sounded awful, especially Brad. I feel a little bad saying it, being that he's passed.

Drew Hirschfield : It was my second time seeing them and I just remember Brad looking just awful. He was smoking lots of cigarettes during the set. Josh Drake : When Sublime was on, I went up to the balcony where they had the fire escape doors open, and you could get some fresh air. And of course, there were some guys with big army jackets standing around clearly smoking weed, and me, sidling up to them, trying to stand in the circle hoping they'd pass it to me. It was a gross-tasting wooden pipe that everyone's mouth had been on, it was disgusting.

Tom Gaffey : In those days that was acceptable behavior. Nowadays, our rules are stricter and stricter. The party finally ate us up. Jared Powell : I left the show. Drew Hirschfield : It was a show I was stoked about because I had become a real fan, and then there was something worrisome and sadly disconnected about the band.

Eric Wilson : It was a hit-and-miss thing for us. We used to drink a lot. We just thought the world was ours, or whatever. Jason Boggs : They had the halfpipes at the front. It was almost like a rec center, the way it was set up. Hollie Simons : There were pro skateboarders skating on the ramps while they were playing, and people were just going nuts. I wanna say Mike Carroll was one of them? My friends I was with, they were more in awe of the skateboarders than the band itself.

Rhi Smith-Guerrero : I stayed in the back. I remember that the pit was pretty rowdy. I was being a little more cautious than I would have been in the past couple years prior to that. I had pit injuries. Sara Sugrue : There was this one guy that I couldn't take my eyes off of.

I recall him being dressed in all black, and wearing a skirt, and he decided to dance ballet-style in the pit. He would pirouette through some macho douchebags that were pushing people around, and he looked so free, without a care in the world of what others thought.

Eric Wilson : Lou Dog running around on stage, that was typical, yeah. He probably bit somebody too. Rhi Smith-Guerrero : My friend was up in the front, and I guess he buddied up to this big, burly, muscly black dude who was their merch guy, and so he left with a bunch of stickers, pins and t-shirts and stuff.

Lil' Mike : Sublime would give you 10 copies of their records, and be like, "Give these to your bros, let people know about us!

Hollie Simons : We snuck backstage, which was amazing for us, in our Osh-Kosh overalls, and really curly hair, with a Mickey's 40 oz. I was There was lots of weed, and it was crowded. We just stood there in the corner, in awe, drinking out of our Big Gulps full of beer. Eric Wilson : It was always a scene backstage. We had our guard down, so we didn't see what [Brad] was up to. Tom Gaffey : Rick Bonde called me the next day and said, "Tom, I want you to know this wasn't your fault.

Eric Wilson : I was asleep in the motor home. We woke up to have bloody marys, and I sent my friend inside the hotel to get some ice for the bloody marys. And he came back frantically crying. Died in San Francisco. Rick Bonde : Bud [Gaugh, Sublime drummer] found him.

What I heard is that Lou Dog was on the bed, licking Brad's face. Bud looked at him, and there was zero question. Lou was licking the vomit off of him, his face was green-colored. There was no saving him. Obviously it was over. Boots Hughston : At first I thought it was bullshit. I thought somebody was pulling my leg. That's the kind of band they were, always goofing off.

He's not here anymore.