Our latest edition of Mixtapes finds Sublime’s Jakob Nowell creating a playlist to get pumped for the band’s new music, festival, and cruise.
Sublime are about to celebrate their 30th anniversary by performing their self-titled LP in full at Red Rocks in Colorado — but that’s just the first of a many exciting things coming from the band. With Jakob Nowell at the head, the groups has their first album in nearly three decades, Until the Sun Explodes, set for release on June 12th, plus their upcoming touring festival and Reef Madness cruise. (Get tickets to all their upcoming shows here!)
Yes, it’s a new age for the returning Long Beach project, and we wanted to see how Nowell felt about it all. We invited the singer to our friends at Gold-Diggers in Los Angeles to feel out his vibes the best way we know how: with a game of Mixtapes!
What gets him and bandmates Eric Wilson and Bud Gaugh into the Sublime writing mood? “Strawberry” by Butthole Surfers. What’s going to soundtrack the christening of the Reef Maddness cruise? Why?’s “Jonathan’s Hope.” How wil he cope with baggage handlers breaking his guitar before that first festival stop? “(For a While) I Couldn’t Play My Guitar Like a Man” by Aaron Freeman (aka Gene Ween!).
But we also wanted to know how he’d kick off a Long Beach playlist (Vince Staples’ “Norf Norf”), how he’d feel about his shelved Jakob’s Castle record leaking (Ween’s “Big Fat Fuck”), and how he’d start the next compilation from his SVN/BVRNT collective/label (Untitled’s “Restless”). Other deep-cut prompts — which made Nowell exclaim, “Dude, did Nardwuar write these?” — elicited tracks by Oingo Boingo, Guster, John Lennon, BROCKHAMPTON, Queens of the Stone Age, and more.
See how Sublime’s Jakob Nowell put together his unique playlist by watching his Mixtapes session above or via YouTube. You can also listen to the full playlist via Spotify below or on Qobuz. For more on Sublime, make sure to revisit Bud Gaugh’s appearance on The Story Behind the Song podcast, in which he dives into the history of “Wrong Way.”
Editor’s Note: This interview was recorded prior to the announcement that the Sublime Festival had changed its name. This note was added after publication of the original article.