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Bradley James Nowell
This section of my site is dedicated to the memory of Bradley Nowell.
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Brad |
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Brad and his son Jakob |
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Biography
Bradley was, in some ways, extraordinary, but most aspects of his life were relatively normal. It's not often that people get to see how a famous person's life parallels their own. The product of a broken home, Brad grew up to develop an incredible talent and major insecurities. Everyone has insecurities, but Brad's reaction to that inner doubt is what makes his story all the more dramatic. The further Brad pushed his creativity, the more he worried that people wouldn't accept him. This insecurity, in a sense, would eventually lead to his overdose and his death.
Brad's parents divorced when he was a child and he lived with both his mother and his father while growing up. When he was nine he was diagnosed with Attention Defecit Disorder, a behavior condition which causes symptoms such as hyperactivity in children. Brad's father, Jim, and his mother disagreed on treatment; while he was with his dad he was put on medication and with his mother he was not. So not only did he have a biological chemical imbalance, it was made worse by the inconsistency of the medicine.
Jim described Brad as "a loving son, who always had a hug and an 'I love you' for his father (J. Nowell, 1996). Brad loved his sisters, brother and stepmothers, both of whom he called 'mom'. Janie, Jim's second wife, says that she was amazed at what a well-mannered boy he was, even into his teenage years. He had special relationships with his aunts and uncles and especially his Grandpa Louie and Grandma Mackie. He named both of his dogs after them. While this may seem an insult, he and his dalmatian Lou-Dog were inseparable. He was even the mascot for Brad's band.
Bradley was a seeker of truth and perfection in life and in his music. He and his dad had many conversations about the meaning of life and his place in it. He read book after book in search of wisdom. He read the works of old philosophers and biographies of great men during his early questioning years. "He read accounts of man's history in search of understanding our world. He sought for the wisdom of the universe in an imperfect world only to find that man is fated only to ask the questions, the answers to which are known only to God. He looked to expand his mind and seek escape, which he found in drugs, but came too close to the edge with them and unintentionally took his own life."
When Bradley was 11 years old, he went on a vacation with Jim to Jamaica. There he heard Reggae music and fell in love with it. He learned how to play the guitar and played every day for the rest of his life. After starting his first band, 'Hogan's Heroes', at 13, Bradley is considered a musical genius by all who have heard and appreciated his music. In the late 1980's he formed Sublime, a 3-piece band in Long Beach, California. Sublime has been described as having gone from "a group of backyard beer buddies to a renowned musical entit." Bradley stated that "Sublime is a hodgepodge of all types of bands I have been into since I was a kid." With Eric Wilson playing bass, Floyd "Bud" Gaugh on drums and Brad as lead singer and guitarist, the group mixed sounds of reggae, hi-hop, dance-hall, ska, punk, rockabilly and blues to create a sound that is truly unique, a quality that makes Sublime stand out above the rest. "The bottom line is," said Bradley, "I love good music and I try to shy away from all these labels people think are so necessary to slap on music. It seems like people get afraid of a certain music if they can't pigeonhole it to their satisfaction. Good music is good music, and that should be enough for anybody."
Sublime's first live performance on July 4, 1988, was so explosive that it caused the "Peninsula Riot" of Long Beach. The band's sheer energy carried through into their music; often they would play two to four songs as if they were one. Focusing strictly on live acts in the early years, "Sublime amassed a nearly fanatical Southern California following that would do just about anything (or anyone?) to catch one of their blistering sets." As the group's popularity grew, so did their touring radius. "Over ten major tours, three vans, and one motor home later, the band had spread its garage-hall gospel all across America, creating a rabid grass-roots following everywhere they go, especially among the surf/skate/snowboard constituency.". In 1994 they were signed on the "Sno-Core Tour", a boarding festival that destroyed ski resorts and hotel rooms throughout Utah, Colorado, Wyoming, Idaho and California. The next year they went on the "Warped Tour", performing around the US and Costa Rica and then organized and headlined "the Three-Ring Circus" that toured the West Coast
Sublime released their first album four years after they formed. "40 oz. To Freedom" was originally recorded for under $1,000 and has, over time, sold hundreds of thousands of copies, the first 30,000 sold directly from the trunks of the band member's cars. It was on the Billboard charts for 50 weeks. The last 30 weeks it was in the top 20 and spent 5 weeks as the Billboard Pacific region #1 New Artist Top Seller. The CD has 23 tracks with every kind of genre from dub to reggae to hard-core punk and contains covers of songs like the Grateful Dead's "Scarlet Begonias," Bad Religion's "We're Only Gonna Die For Our Arrogance," The Toyes "Smoke Two Joints," and George Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue," along with samples from many others as part of the dub style. One song, "Get Out," was later cut for using a sample without permission. Bradley had a love for all types of music and he expressed it through Sublime. All original songs were written by Bradley Nowell. In 1994 "Robbin the Hood" was released, Sublime's second album recorded partially on 4-tracks in various living rooms and abandoned crack-houses. This CD had many of the same kinds of music as the first, but added more dubs and included spoken soliloquies. Though not as huge a success as "40 oz.," it aided their popularity and served as a precursor to the untapped possibilities of Sublime.
The band's high point, career-wise, was in 1996 when they signed with MCA records for their third album. Self-titled, it was reviewed highly and has reached "Gold" selling status. John Bush of All-Music Guide stated that "Brad Nowell sounds almost unbelievably like Jamaican reggae icon Bob Marley" and "Nowell's guitar work is smooth and perfectly executed" with "lyrical content that ranges from lighthearted and slightly inane (with lapses into Spanish during explicit descriptions) to brutally effective and unique commentary that seems to linger in the listener's mind" . Sadly, Bradley never lived to see its success.
Before the release of Sublime's first album, Brad decided to try an 'experiment.' He was a musician and wanted to live the life of a rock star. In his eyes that life included heavy partying and drugs. He followed the example of so many artists and saw heroin as a way to expand his creativity. This experiment was only intended to last for two years until his career took off and he got to where he wanted to be. But as with hard-core drugs, heroin is addictive and Bradley was hooked. Already a marijuana addict and alcoholic, he began to party harder and tried every drug available. Several times, he sold his guitar and equipment to a pawn shop for drug money the night before a live show and his manager, Miguel Happholdt, had to buy it back for him in order to perform. Though his first attempt at quitting came with MCA's offer to produce their third album, Brad was sent home from recording it until he could function normally, if not soberly. It was then he knew he HAD to quit, if not for himself but for his new family.
In 1993 Bradley met Troy Dendekker at a party. They were good friends until they began dating almost a year later. She grew up with drug addict parents and said that she liked addicts because they are the type of people she's used to being around. In many of Bradley's songs, he laments not 'having someone' ("I know some day my day will come; I know some day I'll be the only one"), and he was so proud of his girlfriend that when they were together he used to have Troy come on stage so he could show her off to everyone. Troy became pregnant with their son, Jakob Markus, and they were married eleven months later on May 18, 1996, in Las Vegas. Bradley checked into rehabilitation that year and emerged completely clean; life was seemingly perfect for him and his family.
He stayed clean for more than two months, until one night after a show in San Francisco. The band partied to celebrate and Bradley slipped. Already high from enormous amounts of marijuana found in his system, he did heroin and was found dead in his hotel room the next morning. |
Sublime |
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