Artist Friendly with Joel Madden - Jakob Nowell of Sublime

Episode Date: August 14, 2024

On this week's episode of Artist Friendly, Joel Madden is joined by Jakob Nowell of Sublime. After disbanding in 1996, Long Beach ska veterans Sublime reunited at this year’s Coachella — with Nowell filling in for his late father, Bradley. Between honoring his father’s legacy and creating his own futuristic songs as Jakobs Castle, Nowell has proved that he’s a talented musician who’s determined to keep rock ’n’ roll a family affair. He’s played a handful of shows in support of this year’s debut album, Enter: The Castle, has plans to revive old Sublime compositions, and gets into a nearly hour-long chat with Madden about his whirlwind year. ------- Listen to their Artist Friendly conversation on ⁠⁠⁠⁠Spotify.⁠⁠⁠ ------- Follow Artist Friendly! IG: @artist.friendly TikTok: @artist.friendly YouTube: youtube.com/@artist.friendly ------- Host: Joel Madden, @joelmadden Executive Producers: Joel Madden, Benji Madden, Jillian King Producers: Josh Madden, Joey Simmrin, Janice Leary Visual Producer/Editor: Ryan Schaefer Audio Producer/Composer: Nick Gray Music/Theme Composer: Nick Gray Cover Art/Design: Ryan Schaefer Additional Contributors: Anna Zanes, Neville Hardman Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey, what's up? I'm Joel Madden, and this is artist-friendly. On this episode, I'll be talking to singer and songwriter and frontman of Jacob's Castle and the new frontman of Sublime, Jacob Noll. Let's go. Do you play Fortnite? I've never played it. I'm a huge gamer and stuff. I'm very aware of, like, I guess the culture behind it. No, I never played myself. I play a little Fortnite. I don't play a lot of Fortnite. I started playing with my son because he got really into it during the pandemic. He still plays a little.

He doesn't play a lot. But I probably play more than he does now. And I play with one of my friends uses a Dragon Ball Z skin. They have so much stuff in there. It's like it's so huge, you know. I think Sublime actually just got synced for some songs on Fortnite. Great. Isn't that crazy?

I'm like, what kind of world is this where? My pop songs are good. It just blew my mind, man. That's a good question. It's this world. Yeah. It's the modern world we live in where like, for real. There's this like, I found lately in the last year or two, there's been a real shift in music discovery and like what the modern, like, I would say like the modern music fan isn't just young people, but they tend to be the ones who dictate the culture.

Oh, totally. Youth culture, you know? Yeah. And what you could say is like this like neo classic rock music, right? Because it's not like when we think of classic, classic rock. How old are you? 28. Okay, 28.

I'm 45. We're somewhere like closer to each other than, well, you're probably like closer to my son's generation so you could probably understand them more. But you sit in the middle of the analog. Oh, totally. And the digital. Yeah. I was still in the era where like growing up in high school, no one had smartphones.

yet. Right. So there was still sort of this idea that, I don't know, you know, classic rock was the specific thing. It's like Led Zeppelin. Yeah, you think Led Zeppelin, you think Jimmy Hendricks, you think that kind of stuff. Like, but now, yeah, when you say neoclassical, it's so true. Like, kids will think stuff from the 90s, you know what I mean? Like, a hundred percent 90s. It's like Oasis is classic rock to them. Oasis, Allison Chains. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Sublime. Yeah, totally. Even our band. We're on the, like, edge of that, you know, even though we came out in the late 90s, early 2000s, that's when we really started to, like, get into the world. It's still on the tail end of that music because we made our records analog in the early days.

Anyways, our first few records. So, like, there's this, like, wave of discovery. And it's not even like a, like some people say it's like a revival. I don't think it's a revival. I actually think it's people digging deeper because digital music, like track-based music, which I don't have a problem with. My kids like love that. But even them, I see them like starting to dig.

It's like they're discovering these kind of like really rich sounding records. Yeah. And it kind of stands a test of time, right? It's like almost like that guitar hero test. Like will the kids still think this music is dope? And it's like, oh, it is. It's amazing, well-written stuff coming from that era. And me growing up with like, yeah,

late 90s or only 2000s. That's like my jam. I actually made an analog record only one time, and I bring it up to give a shout out and a rest and peace to the late and great Steve Albini. Oh yeah, rest in peace. We did a record with him. It was the only to tape record I ever made, and it was like one of the best recordings, but he was just legendary dude, you know? What's the name of that record? It never saw the light of day. It's sitting in a vault in an old bandmates like, you know, safe somewhere. And are you ever going to put it out? I would love to now. Now I feel like I should hit him up and be like, dude, we got to, we got to dust.

Blow the dust off that thing because we made it. We did like 10 songs in three days. We were just young 20s kids. Just like drink a bunch of coffee into the 12 hour session. All the tape, no click tracks. And, you know, I don't think I'll ever do an album like that again. I mean, I hope maybe in the future. But he was just such a robotic like on point old school cat, you know, like he was just, this is

the way you make records. Yeah. And bam. I mean, truly one of the great record makers of all time. Mm-hmm. Oh, yeah. Just really special and gone too soon. Yeah.

I was thinking about him this morning, obviously. Right. I was lucky this morning. I had, like, more time than usual. My kids are in, like, high school, it's busy. You know, in the morning. Oh, yeah. You're like going to school, drop off, all that stuff.

Today was particularly quiet because one of the kids didn't have school and blah, blah, blah. So I had this, like, time and space to, like, reflect. A little bit. Reflect. And that, obviously, the news of his passing this morning was like the first thing I saw. It wasn't fully hit me. It kind of blows my mind. Like, yeah, I'll never forget.

Working with him was a trip, but we got in there. And he was just so like, he comes in. He was wearing like a full jumpsuit, like a mechanic suit and like a beanie. And he was like, oh, there. My name is Stephen. I'll be your engineer today. Like, all right. And he, no production stuff.

He made that very clear from the get go. He's like, I'm your engineer. Right. So what kind of record are we making, fellas? And we're like, well, this is what we want to do. And he's just like, I'll go shut it up. And no assistance. He just set up his entire studio all himself over in Chicago, electrical audio.

And I'll never forget, too. We would do these long sessions. I never saw the guy eat once. Wow. He would just drink these giant piping hot coffees that his interns would make, you know, the interns from the local engineering university, whatever. And he had this like coffee machine in his studio. And there was like a laminate thing that they printed out and all the bands would sign and say,

It was like a whole thing. It's like electrical audio has these things called fluffy coffees where they would make like an espresso machine with really whipped up milk. So you'd create this giant fluffy drink and then he put a bunch of maple syrup in it. Oh, wow. And he just would drink like four of those a day and I never saw him eat food. Yeah. He was just working like a machine, man.

They'd just like caffeine and sugar. Yeah, exactly. And just, yeah, talking about how records sounded like back then. I mean, he was always like, people say tape sounds warmer. He's like, I don't know about that. He's like, to him, it was just the way you made a record. It just was part of that process. Like, something came out of that.

So it is awesome to get to have that experience for sure. Yeah. It's cool to hear that. That's really cool. Yeah, it was a trippy experience, man. And such a just professional pro. But also to me feels so right. I can only imagine how interesting your life has been, right?

And so I was really excited to talk to you. Because I've been kind of following you. I'm a huge sublime fan. I would say that's one of the bands that, like, you know, in my early musical development of understanding, like, songs. And all I really had as a teenager was the radio. Right, right, right. And certainly in the 90s, like, alternative radio was so, it was such a thing.

Oh, yeah. In Southern California, of all places, too. It was, like, definitely a movement. Right. So I grew up in Maryland and I didn't get to travel as a kid. I didn't get to see anywhere outside of where I was where I grew up, which was a small like country town. And I used to dream about California.

It was always like my dream was to go to California. It just seemed like this place where everything was like, it's magical and there was all these great bands and it was like a culture. Sublime was one of the, was one of the bands that I would say early, early on like help it really formulated my my understanding of songs the genre mash the mashing up of genres it seemed like to be like there was a lot of rules in the in the music seem like and so um so I can only imagine uh so to me one of the greatest

bands of all time right I just think one of the greatest I appreciate the bands of all time so it blows my mind to think about it yeah so to grow up with your father's legacy, you only really got to know your father probably through his music and what your family told you. And, you know, so I can only imagine how difficult slash just strange that is, right? But it's all you've ever known, right? So, oh, totally, man. It's my life. It's like a screwy way to grow up. That's for sure. Like, I don't know. sometimes people will see it and like I could be out somewhere and someone comes up and has this longwood story they want to tell me about sublime or whatever and it's like so

flattering and cool and then the friend I'm with is like man that's so crazy I'm like no no no what's crazy is the the show I just played what happened right there with that person that is my life like that is just since I was a child and I would say my mom did a good job of kind of like sheltering me from it, you know, grew up in like a really crazy kind of Southern California, insane household with a lot of partying and wild weirdness and not like the the rock style partying or like the white trash version of that. Right. Like it just wasn't really like around like that.

Like we had some of the, I guess, stuff on the walls. Aside from that, it was kind of always in the background, you know. You know, I dropped out of school. I was like 17 and just started working like the local bagel shop and then moved to Long Beach, worked at the hardware store and just the next 10 years tried to make it with my own band and stuff. And then I finally found a little bit more success with a new project I started called Jacobs Castle, my solo project. I like it.

We got an epitaph. It was really cool. Yeah, the records were opening. Oh, thank you so much. Check it out. The single is great. Oh, man, that's really nice you to say, man. That's like huge accolades, man.

It's really good. Far out, dude. Let's go. It's got, uh, so. For me, when I listen to the, to the music, especially the latest single and the stuff you put out from the record. And you have a new record coming out, right? Enter the Castle, or is that already out? Enter the Castle is the one that just came out. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Correct. Okay. So catch me is the- Yes, that's like my favorite one. That's the song for me that I listen to over and over again.

That is so huge, man. You know, it's funny because you said, you know, like you hearing my dad's music growing up. I grew up with y'all's music. Oh, really? I swear to, yeah, it was like, that era was just like, I don't know, man, like early being on the internet and like MySpace and going out to like hot topic places like that. That was like my culture and my shit and the stuff that inspired me to make this project. So it's just, it's really interesting how the whole cycle of music works. It's like we always ask ourselves, why do we do it? Why do we keep putting ourselves through this and making the stuff? And I think that's wise because it's just the next generation takes it and you never know who it's going to, go into effect. Yeah, so that is actually what I was thinking about. And I couldn't articulate it. So it might take me a minute. But from birth to now, you've been living in the world in your real life, right, the real person, not the idea of Jacob. Right. Right. So I started, when you first put out music, I saw something and I was like, oh, that's cool. Right. Yeah. Yeah. I have a theory that greatness comes from greatness. Right. So I just have a feeling. I just have, I just believe. I just believe. it like I believe that apples come from apple trees, right? So I have this like theory about you

that when you discover your own greatness, likely in music, right? You're right. You just, the apple doesn't fall far from the tree, as they say, right? So in your, in your own, but, but then you have to live your own real life. Right. But in your real life is this back, like you're saying, this, this, this song or story playing in the background. It's like a movie that's always on on a screen behind you. Constantly. And it's your father's legacy. Yep.

Yeah. Inescapable. So the idea of that to all of us is like, oh, wow, cool, right? And then there's the reality of that for someone who's finding out who they really are in the world as a real person that has to build a life and go out into the world every day, make a living, build a life, do all the real things that we have to do that we don't think about when we're scrolling and just looking at snapshots of people. and formulating our opinion of who they probably are.

Yeah. Oh, that must be cool. Well, then, so in my age now at 45, I would pause before I would judge something at face value or by the story, by the headline. Right. Because also we live in a media-driven world where everything's a headline. Oh, yeah. So they're going to throw around actually heavy stuff.

Oh, yeah. Personal stuff. Personal stuff. Yeah. And you just have to, you just have to. you just have to have the self-esteem, which also is something we have to get on our own. Dude. And the integrity and the class to be able to smile and move through people minimizing these big ideas, right?

Like our relationship with our dad or our non-relationship with our dad. Whatever the relationship is, we have a relationship with the idea of our fathers. Oh yeah, it's a big human thing for sure. Every human in the world has some idea of the father as like an archetype in our life, whether we had a relationship with them or not. I had a very complicated relationship with my dad. When I was young, it's been a big piece of my life trying to figure that out, trying to make sense of that.

And on the other side of it, my dad's passed away, but I got to make amends and have that with my father in the best way that I could. Yeah. Wasn't perfect. It's complicated. but now people would write about that and just throw it out there as a headline of the story. Yeah, like so so does this. So his father, he reunites, he blah, blah, blah, blah. Like, that's how they would put it. That's why I never shared it. Minimizing this incredibly

connective moment just to a headline. It's just to a headline that people will click through and scroll through for five minutes and gather what they want from it. That's the reality of entertainment. That's the reality of art when it's commercialized and whatever. and that's a part of making a living as an artist. But it makes me really happy to see you on the other side of youth. Right. And I know you're sober. You've talked about that.

Yeah. Which is a huge deal. Oh, yeah, a big part of my life for sure. A lot of people don't get that. And a big part of the story, too, in a lot of ways, you know, like if you look at all these things, all these personal moments in your life, it's sort of like a story. And we have to because we're storytellers. Like anything that happened to me is only.

only so good as it's worth in drama. You know what I mean? If it's not like a good dramatic thing, then how can I use that? Anyways. Yeah, exactly, right? And it's just this funny thing. But yeah, my dad obviously passed away from a heroin overdose. And I think during that era, there was so much like opiate, like media happening, you know, train spotting and all this stuff. Like, and now we're at this. Yeah, yeah, that was a moment. Yeah, you know, and then people are talking about the 27 club all the time. And now with these younger generation artists, it's more like it's the 17. Fentanyl kills people a lot quicker. It seems like. So you see the culture starting to change where, you know, no one really calls you square if you don't want to do a bump of fentanyl at a party. It's not like,

you might have been square for not wanting to do the blow. But fentanyl, it's like, no, no, no, that killed my cousin or that killed my friend's cousin. You know, everybody knows somebody. And so I I think me being sober is a big part of like, okay, I'm never going to escape the, comparison. I'm never going to escape who I am. My name is Jacob Noel. I can't change my name and cut my hair and go work on a farm somewhere. I could do all that stuff and that's sometimes that's people's goal in life, but part of me knows that I'm an entertainer and it is what I want to do and it fixes or completes something inside of me. So if I'm going to step in the light and do that, I can't, I have to embrace who I am in some way. And I appreciate you saying that it's classy or

whatever because I don't look at myself as sublime as my band. I don't look at myself as the front man or lead singer, even if I have to say it in headlines or in a bio on Instagram or whatever, like, they asked me to do the gig. Like, this is a job that I get to do. And I just feel really grateful that I get to portray that role for people. I almost kind of look at it like an acting gig. Well, I see that. Yeah. I see it kind of like, man, I feel like, regardless of if we knew our fathers or not, right, they weren't perfect. Yeah. But we're like standing on their shoulders somehow. Yeah, we have to. And so for me to honor the part of my father that brought me into this world that on some level, like really loved me, um, but didn't have the development,

the personal development to like navigate what fatherhood means, right, at least what I think, you know, that's only my perspective in my experience. But whatever legacy he had, I do feel like I'm building on that legacy somehow. And my dad was a pretty simple guy. You know, he worked. He was a butcher. He was very old school. But I did feel, I do feel like I'm continuing his legacy somehow.

And that does make me feel some pride. And it is all I have of him. Yeah. And I, at my age now, I appreciate that more than my, I was very angry at him from my early teens to when I reunited with him when I was like 30 I was very angry then I had kids on my own and I kind of understood that he was like just another guy trying to figure it out and um and that we whenever we prop people up as like larger than life and bigger than people we're missing the idea that like no we're all actually human beings having our own experience on this planet

we do sort of lose out on an element of their humanity yeah when we do that and Same thing with me. Actually, my mother and my stepfather who raised me since I was a kid who I called dad, a lot of people don't know that. But I didn't speak to them for years when I got sober because I still had so much resentment over, you know, all of their failures that I perceived growing up. But I'm, like, proud to say we have a good relationship nowadays. And it's all just like, you know, boundaries and stuff. Like, I have to set how much of them I can tolerate and stuff. But I'm never, there's never going to be a moment where you like bust down the door with the flaming sword and go, admit it, admit that you abused me and apologize, Neil,

he's not going to get this sort of like crying confession. It's just, and you start to realize like, what would that solve in me? You know, why would I want that? You know, I am who I am nowadays,

regardless of where my bad traits or trauma came from. And I'm going to move forward, you know. I'm going to accept that part of me and accept who the hell they were. At the end of the day, they didn't do too bad of a job. I'm here, aren't I? Yeah. I think the same thing.

Look, my mom was very complicated too. And we had our issues, but I love her. And I accept the human being that is just another human trying to get through life and figure it out. Exactly. But also, there's the credit you have to give yourself, whether or not, yeah, maybe they did a pretty good job, for sure. I'll take that away from anyone. And also, what if you also did an incredible job figuring your shit out? Right.

Because there's a version of you still on drugs somewhere right now. Oh, totally. And then there's a version of you here sitting here at another day in your real life out here in the world talking about music and being you. So crazy. You know what I mean? No, yeah. It puts a lot in perspective. Because the potentials we have.

Right. Right. The spectrum of potential is really great and really bad. Mm-hmm. And I think extremes. Extremes, right? And so the other potential of me is really bad. And I certainly live some of that.

And so going back to my dad, I always see if I'm living in my like best potential, I'm also living in one of his best potentials. Could have potentially been me. I've been with my wife for 18 years, not to say that it's perfect, but it's more like an accomplishment that we that is. We cherish that we've like worked through all these things and grown. And we both had, we both came to the relationship with lots of luggage that we had to like help each other unpack.

Oh, totally. You know, and she, again, she comes from a musical legacy family. Right, right, right. When you're standing in the shadow of a parent who's done almost an unachievable thing, what do you do? What do you do? What will you ever do that's good enough? Exactly.

To step out from that. Oh, yeah. And then as I think about that, I go, well, what if we don't step out from it? What if we just learn how to be us and we no longer feel like we need to step out from it? That's so well put. You know? It's true. No, you embrace the shadow.

You make it part of yourself and you cast even a bigger shadow later. That's what I feel like, you know, this Coachella thing was amazing and playing with my dad's band's amazing. But to me, it's always a means to an end. I see so much of a bigger empire for sublime and for the stuff that I'm trying to make, stuff that spans even beyond just music. I want to continue this thing and try to reach as many people as I can, make it as big as possible. so then the next poor little motherfucker that I shoot out has to deal with. Yeah.

I think it's hard being a second son, but I bet the third one it's even harder. Elvis's grandson, you know. Yeah, but think about that. I actually think that that is the reality. Yeah. Of your life. It is. I have to do.

You know, it's funny, actually, right before the Sublime stuff was starting, I did this show at Beach Life with my band last year, and then we did this after party at St. Rock nearby. and Fletcher from Pennywise came out there. I don't think he might be telling this story, but it was funny, right after our set. There's a lot of stories about Fletcher out there, so I think he'll be all right, yeah.

And he's just, and I've, you know, I played this song with them one time. They called me to come up and sing with them. One of my dad's songs called Same in the End. They asked me the day of at this show a few months prior to that, and I had never heard the song in my life. Like people just assume I know all the supply material. And I'm up there, like singing it all bad,

like looking at the lyrics on my phone. And he's kind of giving me shit about it. But then after this show, at St. Rock, he pulls me to the side. He pulls me like in an old unused broom closet and we're sitting there with the fucking light hanging and flickering and fletcher's like a thousand feet tall and I'm like, he could just grab my head and just squeam. Yeah, he could. And I'm just like, what's up, man? And he's like, hey, wanted to apologize for joking with you at the show. I didn't really, I didn't understand. I didn't realize. But you got to understand something, man. And I'm like, oh, here. It's like a movie moment. He's like, you don't have to be doing this. You don't have to be doing this with your life right now. You could get on a boat and sail away from it all tomorrow. You do not have to be doing that. And he was just extending this like hand of like, you know, reach out, call me. You know, I'm here as a resource. Use it.

And I looked at him and I go, no, Fletcher, I have to do this. I don't have an option. Like the option is do this or die basically. Yeah. Not literally, but figuratively like that. Then functionally I only have one option. Sure, I got a million. But it's, I feel like I have to embrace the legacy, try to make it as big as I possibly can,

while also doing my stuff in an authentic way and just break my back and die on the wheel of that thing. And if I can do that successfully, start a little family on my own eventually, and then it'll be the next guy or gal's problem. Yeah. Sort of like my 30-year plan right now. The part of you that has to do this is the artist. I think that is what it is, right? Yeah, dude. We all got that bug in us. And he knew it too, and he told me, I'm sure. Yeah, I always tell people when they come into MDDN, don't do this if you don't have to. right but if you have to go all in yeah that's it and that is like for people listening because i'm sure there are people listening that can relate to your story yeah and that's the important part

of sharing but it's to be able to share it honestly and in a space where like you can be yourself totally man um is important and those are hard to find spaces but you have to do this because you're an artist yeah it's a compulsion there's this thing in us where we need to grab as much as we possibly can't. It's funny when my young artist friends ask me like, dude, what's your tip for an aspiring young artist? What should I do? And I'm like, start a family and go to school. Yeah. Don't do this. Just break your guitar in half and pray that you never get the urge to. Yeah, I tell them all the time. I'm like, do not do this if you don't have to. And that's such a good way, that's an elegant way of putting it, man. It's true. Because I, you know, I tour with my band in a small

van and sleep on floors and take showers and Walmart parking lots. You know what I mean? I would be happy, at least in my head now in my like, you know, spry, like 28-year-old self. I'm like, I could do this for years and just be happy. Just if I wasn't doing this, I would just be, I'd be homeless. I'd be a vagrant traveling around the country in one way or another. Yeah. I was really excited to sit with you because I've always, I want to say I've been following you for a couple years. That's so flattering, man.

Like, thank you. Like, for real. That's a trip, you know. I'm stoked because just in these last few years, I'm finally. starting to make music that really makes me excited. I was with the same band for a while called Law and I really liked doing it, but I also simultaneously hated it. Yeah. So now I'm finally with my solo project, Jacob's Castle. It's like, okay, let me draw from all of this stuff that I grew up with, you know. But yeah, man, it's been a blast. And so for me to step into this role with Sublime and have

it coincide, it all just started to click and make sense. I was like, okay. It works together. Exactly. There's a synergy to it. I mean, that is the era that I love anyways, and there is still a big element of that sublime stuff in my music, although reimagined in a modern way. But I'm essentially just trying to do the same thing that my dad did and just mixed together a bunch of different influences in a way that I felt was exciting. It's good. It feels like also that's just artist development. Exactly, man. Everyone's trying to do that. It feels like with the latest music, it's really starting to. to be a developed. Yeah. Yeah. It's really developed.

Oh, yeah. It's good. And I just can't wait to put out more and do more stuff with sublime. Like, we're probably not going to do any like, or at least I should say now, I don't want to. I want everyone to know this now.

I don't want to make a whole new sublime record. I hate when bands come back after nowhere and no one's going to, you know, no matter how good it is, people like, I don't even want to put my stamp on an era of sublime like that. But what we are doing right now is like, remixes of cool old unreleased stuff.

That's cool. Some stuff that was like some jams that the guys did in the studio. And then working with artists that are big in their current scene. Like we got a single with stick figure dropping soon. Cool. And it's called Feel Like That. And I did put a verse in on it, but it's mainly a stick figure song. But we let them use this unreleased sublime stuff.

And so it becomes something that that, to me, that feels more in the spirit. Rather than just making a whole brand new record, it's like, let's take some unreleased stuff. and then let's do another single where we take that and then work with someone who's up and coming in the punk scene or someone up and coming in the hip hop scene. You know, all of these different areas that Sublime drew from, you know, let's make a collaborative and fun.

And that's sort of the idea behind my band, Jacob's Castle, as well. So to me, that was sort of the trick of making it all feel holistic and organic and not forced, you know, and just having fun. Yeah. I would just keep doing what feels right. Yeah. But like, you never know.

You might feel differently. Oh, part of me wants to because I know I could kill. I'm like, I could totally write a sublime song that would sound like part of me is excited by the challenge of seeing if I could make something authentic and cool in that style that kind of no band is really done like that. However, if it does end up happening, I didn't want it. That means they forced my arm. If you're reading this now, it means I'm dead.

Or, or. Or watching this podcast. Yeah. I don't know, though. I would say like what I learned from actually this show from a few different artists that I really picked up this idea. Because I tend to make those judgments on myself. Yeah. I'm like, oh, we shouldn't blah, blah, blah, blah.

And then I like kind of learned like, yeah, maybe that's how I feel now. Maybe I'll feel differently. Honestly, yeah. Or there's this other thing like we don't have to put it out. Could just make it. We could also just fuck around. Yeah. And see what feels good.

something wrong with that. If we just stick with how we feel, we'll know if and when we should put something out, which has been the mantra for Good Charlotte for six years is why we haven't put anything out. And why we haven't toured, but we're like now, now we're talking about touring. And it's, it's so sick. We feel, we didn't, we didn't feel it. And now we feel it. And we're all talking about touring. And like, we're probably going to do a tour next year. Dude, I'm coming out to that. Let's go. Hey, maybe we'll tour together. Dude, that would be so much fun for sure. but we're kind of just continuing to lean into how we feel. Right.

And just keep following that. And I think we struggled to do that in our early career because it was, there was so much at stake and there were so many people that had to say and there was so much. And like we felt the pressure of like, like you said, like, I don't want to seem ungrateful. Yeah, man. There's that whole element of that, you know. But it's not ungrateful. How you feel is how you feel.

It's true. What are you the most excited about as you look at? look at the next like two years of your life. Oh man. I mean, you know, all the stuff that comes with the, you know, doing stuff with the bigger band and doing stuff on a bigger level, it's always kind of the dream, you know.

So I'm really excited. I'm meeting a lot of cool people, working with a lot of cool people now. I mean, doing a podcast like this is awesome to me. Like, you know, definitely more stuff like this. But really, I'm excited to, of course, do some more sublime shows, try to enlarge the brand in the biggest way that we possibly can.

I think one of the biggest tragedies is that my father died before he really got to see any of his own success. And then it sort of stayed in this state where it was never, yeah, and it was never really utilized in the way that, you know, I see a much bigger future and a much larger place for Sublime as a whole as that kind of Southern California sound. and a sort of lynchpin of type of cultural movement in Southern California. And in concert with that, I also see me really, you know, honing my sound for Jacob's Castle, having that trying to be the flag bearer of like this next step that I see if people are into it and they dig it and they see it the way that I see it. So more creative stuff, that's for sure. And I know I'm going to be busy as hell.

I already know this whole year is all booked up. And it's just crazy to see that. And next year's already peeling up fast. So I think making a lot of new friends and doing a lot of fun work out there. It's going to be great. Yeah. Yeah. I think you're ready for it.

Thank you, man. I do. I really do. I think that you've, you know, 28 years is old enough to know what you know and what you don't know. And it's enough life lived, especially your life. As we said, like, is just so unique. There's like so much experience that you have. that you don't even maybe even realize you have yet.

Totally. In navigating like what it means to be you in the world. That I think that you're like poised for a lot of meaningful success in both categories, right? Like we were outside talking and you were telling me about your house and, you know, living with your sister. And it just sounds to me like someone building a life that's like, it sounds really good. Thank you, man. You know? No, yeah.

Family is a huge part of the equation. for me. You know, I love my family and the friends that become close with me and the people I work with become like family as well. So just, you know, trying to enlarge upon and build this huge life. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, a big life, right? Exactly. And then the musical legacy of like taking sublime into the next chapter and then building Jacob's Castle. Those things to me, they work really well hand in hand. Thank you, man. See you the same way. They both kind of breathe life into one another. Yeah, I think it's, I think it's going to be really, really fun and artistically, I think it's going to be really interesting to see what happens when you go out with Sublime and then you come back to Jacob's Castle. Right.

What does that bring back there? And then when you go back from Jacob's Castle to Sublime, what does that take there? Exactly. There's something that like those two are going to actually really be important to one another. Yeah, there, you know? And they both are like two sides of the same coin. Sublime's sort of like the homeland and then Jacob's Castle's like the expeditionary force. Like we go out into the, you know what I think?

Because Sublime, we really don't have any plans to like tour, but we're just sort of doing festivals and stuff like that for this year and probably next year. But Jacob's Castle is like, okay, I'm hungry. I want this. The state as busy as possible. Do as many shows as we possibly can and just, you know, really try to break some new ground. Yeah. Yeah. How many musicians do you have with you in Jacobs Castle?

So I always tell people that my solo project, Jacobs Castle, is a one to four piece. It fluctuates a lot because it really is, it's just me. And then the lineup sort of shifts and changes throughout the years, you know, depending on who's available and who I want to work with. But mainly the project, because it is very electronic and there's a lot of that element. So it's usually me up there with a guitar singing and then also playing the tracks from like my robot on stage, you know. Castlebot 9,000. He's like my true blue bandmate. So I'm sort of doing the DJ thing up there, but a mainstays, I love having a drummer. You know, I feel like having, you can't really emulate

like live acoustic drums. Like even the biggest pop bands in the world, they still like, you just need that to get people moving. Yeah, live drums. Oh yeah. And sometimes I like having another guitar player up there, just so I can put down the guitar for a few songs and they can just sort of do atmospheric stuff over the top. Everyone's always like, get a bass player. I can be your baseball, where I have a bass player. I have a bass player. player. It's like I love the sound of the synth bass coming through the subs in my tracks. It's very like electronic and weird and cool, but there is some live bass elements too. So, you know, if you're a bass player out there and you can also play a synth bass on a mo, you know,

it's funny because my uncle Eric does that for Sublime Live. He'll play some songs with the key bass and then some songs with the bass guitar. So I think eventually I see the band having that kind of lineup. Like me up there, guitarist, a bass player, drummer. and then maybe even like a fifth guy who could do all the DJ stuff. Yeah. But wouldn't it make sense to do that? Like right now we're still playing

smaller cap venues and just doing real rough and tumble touring in a van and sleeping on floors and stuff. So having a smaller crew, like the last tour I did with G-Love, it was just me, my driver slash tour manager

and then my drummer, Jordie. And that was awesome. Touring or three guys were, it was just so easy and smooth and simple. It's sustainable. Yeah. So if we do big, higher profile stuff, guarantees go up, then it's like, okay, maybe we rent a bandwagon and get a bigger crew and more musicians. But my main thing is personality first, you know, way before ability. Like, I'd rather have someone who sucks at their instrument, but they're just down for the cause and just having a great time and loving it. Because I'm still in that phase where it's all just DIY having fun. And I want to just really dig into that and enjoy it. So yeah, yeah, it's been a lot of fun so far. It's the real actual work of

of developing something on the road. Oh, totally, man. What's your relationship like with the guys in Sublime? You said your uncle Eric. Yeah, I consider them like uncles. And it's the way growing up, like in my family, like with my mom. Like my mom's Indonesian. She's half in Indonesian.

So I guess it makes me a quarter. And so like all the friends is like aunties and uncles. Right. They're even just coming around their friends. This is your uncle. Is your auntie, you know? So for me, that's what it's like with them. I mean, especially nowadays, our relationship is awesome.

Like it's so cool. it does feel like a family thing to me because they were so close to my dad and then the other guys we have playing in Sublime it's to me that's what excites me the most about doing Sublime is that we've built this thing and this team and we cut out

and got rid of all the stuff that didn't need to be there you know like obviously of the two OG members and me I'm the original singer's son so it feels kind of makes sense like just that core three thing yeah but then um our guitar player Trey he's playing falling idols you know he was like a little

local guy in the scene and my dad looked up to him and they would always all jam together. He was, he was there. He's from that air, you know, and Dougie, our DJ, you know, used to be in head PE and then, but he grew up right down the street with Eric, my, my base play. It was just, it made sense, you know, they were like childhood friends and, and played together and came up all from the same scene. And then right down to the people we have working behind the scenes, like the whole crew and like my manager's, you know, Kevin Zinger, SRH. And he put on the first sublime shows in San Diego and and Joe Escalante, wherever he may be, you know. Vandals, legend.

Dude, there's this classic flyer, and it's like, the manager, Kevin, it's just SRH presents, and it's like sublime vandals, and the unwritten laws on there. To me, like, that was the, unwritten law. It was like foretold, written, chiseled in stone. It was like, this was meant to happen with all of us here doing this. And, like, the fact that I could be somehow in the center of this trying to pull all these pieces together,

I almost have nothing to do with it, but being born into it gives people and they allow me this sort of grace to kind of hold the flag and be the custodian and bring it all together and to me that is the funnest part of doing Sublime is bringing people together. Yeah, it's like this

SoCal legacy. Yeah, but it's interesting because it's like it's the story. It's also really important in music. Yeah. It's like this really important musical I know we've said the word legacy a lot, but it kind of is like this

really important like Southern California thing that like went out into the world and really actually like affected how people make music, what people do with music, what's possible. Totally. But it's all born out of this like pocket. Yeah.

In this place. And it's all bands at the time when you say all the name of those bands, When you say the vandals, when you say unwritten law, when you say any of the SoCal, that's the shit I grew up looking at going like one day I'll go to Southern California. That's so cool, man. And I'll have a place where I can feel normal. Yeah.

And I can be a part of something. But these are all people that screw up together or met trying to play shows together or like they actually built this thing that became like a global idea. Yeah, yeah, yeah, 100%. And it turned in. things like the warp tour and all these other things that have that still means something to all of us when we think of the idea of that and there are certainly like young people now that wish they could go back in time and live in that era because they feel they feel connected to the music because

the music just lives forever and it lives out in the world and breathes and takes on new life with each generation that completely that finds it and decides what they want to do with it right and you were born in the middle of it right right in the sense of of it. Right? It's interesting. I'm an amen. And, like my music, my cabo can't come with me and has to be able to

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It's like being born in the set. Yeah, it's exactly how you said it. And how could you even know what to do with it until you're old enough to actually? Exactly. And now that's why I think you're so poised to like do such great shit. That's why I felt like I had to. It's like it's just too cool not to. You know what I mean?

But also all the work you've done over the last, you know, 10 years of your own music. Right. Is all part of you learning your craft. Yeah, I wanted to put in the work and not just jump into this stuff. and really a lot of thought went behind getting more involved. Yeah, you have the experience now. Right. No.

And the experience to stand up on the Coachella stage and do it. Yeah. Because you can't do that without experience. Oh, 100%. You'd fall over. Yeah. You also can appreciate what it is, but you can also like not be too overwhelmed with it. You can stand up there in your own skin and do it because of all the experience and all the trying.

where all the years of trying where you probably felt like no one saw it, no one heard it. We've all had that experience as artists, but all those years are not for nothing. Right. They lead to you being able to get up on that big stage and be experienced enough to do it

and show up for it and be there for it. Right. And not, you know, fall over. Right. So true, man. So well done. Thank you so much for that, man. I mean, thinking of it like that,

framing it like it makes me feel and just how fun this is you know and that i think that's the next step what i'm most excited for like doing these shows is awesome but i'm i'm so excited for what is next and bringing musicians and bands together both old and new and and creating events and stuff like that like what if we brought back another warp tour style traveling event you know what i mean like yeah yeah like something that really captures people's imaginations and minds with that sort of because so many kids who missed out on that era now look back on it with this like, man, I wish I could have been a part of that. There could be this sort of the way that trends go and in history, if you look at stuff,

it's, it's been enough years for there to be sort of this neo revival. Absolutely. Yeah. There's always going to be another one. Yeah, yeah, there has to be. Have you ever thought about writing a book? Oh, man. Yeah, actually, it was funny enough.

A lot of people don't know. I went to school for creative writing. Where'd you go to school? Cal State Long Beach. Oh, wow. You know, it's a good school. Dude, I dropped out of high school in junior year and started working. And then later on.

work. I started working at a, what is it, a bagel shop in San Diego and P.B. The Brueger's bagels on Garnett. And then eventually, you know, it's funny. I actually did a stagehand work at Coachella when I was like 17 or 8. I don't even think I was old enough to work. Like I just signed the thing and I just did like some backstage stuff for Golden Voie. I remember our shift started at midnight and we worked all the way till noon. And I didn't get to see a single band or anything. They would just finish up at the 10. They're like, all right, start pushing boxing. I swear they'd just tell us to push the boxes to one field. And they'd be like, right, push them back.

And it was just hours of pushing things back and forth. Hopping on trucks and inhaling dust. And I did that for a couple years and a stage coach as well. And it was funny because Joe introduced me to Paul Tillett the last Coachella we just played. And I met him. And I just remembered in that moment. I was like, oh, dude, I used to work here.

And Paul was like, what? It was like from going from working there to like playing on the mainstay. It was just like, I hadn't even. thought like 10 years ago is what I was when I did that and the hardware store a billings paint and hardware is like this it's like right of passage for for like my my uncles work there too when they were younger the local hardware store and in long beach and um and then eventually I wanted to go back to school my grandparents are going to help me out and I went to community college and I remember I signed up for it they're like all right well you better sign up for classes um

before we can let you in do you have like a GED or a high school diploma and I was like yeah sure I do they're like, well, sign up for the classes now, but be sure to send that into us. I'm like, yeah, yeah, definitely, I will. I never got it. They never checked for my, I mean, I shouldn't even say this, but yeah,

never checked for my GED or diploma. It turns out high school's optional unless you want to go to like a really good college, but yeah. So I just did community college for like 100 years and then went to state. And so to answer the long way. Thank you, thank you.

So you're a college graduate. Yeah, sort of, you know. Yeah, kind of. Yeah. Okay. So am I. Yeah, yeah. Okay, I have like a couple more classes

to graduate from state. But come on, they're electives. How am I going to learn more about creative writing by, you know, taking, you know, the humanity? You won't. I'm going to go back someday and probably try to get my master's and doctorate when, you know, time permits. The college of touring in a van is a better college. Dude, that's why I didn't finish my life. I had one more semester to go.

But I got an offer for Jacobs Castle to go on tour with my friends band sitting on Stacy. And I'm like, I got to do this. Yeah. Everyone's like, well, you could just do it on the computer while you're on the road. I'm like, no, I can't. Yeah. I'm not going to open up the laptop while I'm on the road. in the van. It's just not going to happen. And I'm happy I made that choice. But I did learn a lot at my time.

I love writing so much. So book totally down with that. I can see it. I write a lot of short stories. I really want to write for television. It's been like what I went to school for. It's like my dream. So yeah, man. Yeah. You're close with your grandparents. Yeah. Is that your dad's parents? Yeah, correct. Yeah. And they were really like the stable part of my upbringing. You know, they were they were like my parents to some degree too, you know, with my mom and my dad, you know, my mom keeps saying, tell me. She's like, quit telling people that we were like a crazy white trash household. Like that's not true. That's not true. And I'm like, okay, mom, fine. Never mind. We were, uh, uh, let's say an alternative lifestyle growing up at my mom's house.

It was looser. It was looser. Yeah. My grandparents are a little bit more traditional. Um, and, uh, a little bit more stable and they encouraged me and my education. When I, when I was little, my grandpa would read me, uh, Joseph Campbell, you know, here with thousand faces. So I really got a lot of that. That's also what I studied a lot in school was like mythology. and like I have like all sorts of mythological figures tattooed all over me and stuff because like to me that's the epitome. Yeah. It's all terrible.

It's all part of the human myth, right? Terrible joke. And that's what we do it for, you know. We tell these stories because they help us make sense of this weird thing called life that probably has no meaning except for what we give it. And that's what's so fun about my life too is like it was just right there from the beginning, the Joseph Campbell stuff and this hero's. journey and then all the stuff with my family and the scene and building this thing, it's like,

when it's at the best and I start thinking of it like that, then I'm like, oh, this is my life's purpose and it gives me meaning and it's so much fun. And I just try to focus on that element when I can and not fall down to bad dots. Yeah. That's what we all are trying to do. Yeah. Continuous cut. I think we feel, I think we all feel the same in a lot of ways, like the human being is like we're all actually trying to not fall over. And we look out at other people and we go, it must be easy or, oh, that must be great. And we don't realize like, nah, every human is actually just trying to figure it out. Right.

And, you know, some of us learn how to keep it together better than others. Some of us learn how to present really well. That's part of it, right? Like presenting well is a thing. It's all a parlor trick. Some people will be like, oh, dude, you're so charismatic. They're so good to talking to people. It's like, no, I'm not by nature.

I'm really like, me growing up, I was. total out. Like, I had to go through this whole crazy process of just learning and trying to mask and show and be able to be like, okay, if I'm going to do this job, I have to learn these skills. Like the biggest part of the job for me wasn't just learning to play the instruments. It's learning how to interact socially successfully. Yeah. You know, because, I'm and I still don't do it right all the time. I'm just shooting blanks. You know, I'm just a parlor trick. Me either. I do feel like the part of me that shows up to be the. guy that everyone's expecting.

Yeah. Is a part of me. Yeah. That I had to learn how to hone and I had to learn how to be that guy more and more and more and more. Exactly. That's why all the van touring was essential in that development. Oh, totally. But you can fuck up a lot in small and controlled environments.

And these days it's a little harder because everyone gets everything on film. Yeah, totally, totally. But when people are like, oh, you have it all together. Like, no, I don't. I'm an anxious wreck. Yeah. And I'm depressed most of the time. Oh, totally.

You know, and then you learn how to fight against that and you learn how to make that the smaller part of you and make the part of you that shows up for life in every situation, which is maybe you're more, maybe you have to force yourself to be more outgoing and you have to practice at that. Maybe you have to force yourself to be healthier. Everybody has their tough spot. But that part of me, I had to learn how, and at 45, it's easier for me than it was at 28. Totally.

In fact, you're way further along than I was at 28. Like, as a person, I sit here and talk to you, and I don't know if I could have had this conversation at 28. Right, right, right. So that says a lot about your maturity. And I think when you've been through a lot in life, you mature faster. Yeah. Or you get stunted.

In some ways, I was really mature. I was really self-sufficient. And in some ways, I was super stunted. In some ways, I'm very, no, it's very true. And so I had to go to therapy and all that. So that is the thing being able to show up for those moments in life and stand on stage of Coachella and do it. Dude, I remember when I first moved to Long Beach when I was 17, one of my first mentors is my uncle Miguel. He was also in sublime.

A lot of people don't know. Like he was on the original inner band agreement, you know. Right. Play guitar and he's got vocals and a lot of songs. And he was really like traveling front of house sound guy too. And he just showed me the ropes in a lot of ways. And I remember he told me once, Jake, there are people out there who would. you could be wearing a big Santa outfit playing Christmas carols and people would still be like

keep the dream alive Jake he's just he's doing these kids you know and so some people ask me like what do you do with that you know what do you do in this weird life and it's like well we got a show in Indio give me my big fucking red hat and I'm going to put it on and go up there and be Mr. Santa Claus for the night man like this is the role that I chose for myself and I stepped in and it is my fucking life this is what my life is I can tell all of the the weirdness, all of the uncertainty, all of the good parts, too. I wouldn't trade it for the world, man, because I actually really, really like it. Yeah, no, I can tell. Yeah. And you were born for it. Yeah. Thank you, man. I think so too. You know, like, have you ever heard of the term royalty and exile?

Yeah. I think it's also something like, for many years of your life, you probably questioned, what the hell am I even doing? And then one day you woke up and you were like, oh, I know what I'm doing. That is kind of what it was like, man. And then whenever you get your flowers, whenever that moment comes where everyone realizes it, it doesn't matter because it's the moment you realize it. Yeah. Right.

And it all comes together. I feel like you're in that. It's the act of doing. That is really the reward. It's not just getting the flowers, like you said. Yeah. And I think like the next 10 years. of your life is that is the full realization of like what you were born to do totally man um stepping

into it finally being comfortable with it i'm excited for you thank you man yeah jacob yes thanks for coming dude thanks joel appreciate it man so nice to meet you so much for having me man we got to do this again yeah anytime you want we got to do like a check-in you know we'll come back anytime you want come back yes this is the best awesome bro this is one of the best i've done thanks man i hope you enjoy today's of artist friendly. If you really liked it, you can follow, like,

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