Long Beach Beer Lab has formally partnered with Sublime to create a Mexican lager that has already won medals. (It won gold at the San Diego County Fair for a light lager.) And it is “crushable to the point that you probably could down 40 ounces and be content,” co-owner Levi Fried said, referencing the famed album of the band.
“When you embrace good people and good opportunities—no matter how big or how small—it all comes back to you,” said Levi, who runs both the Long Beach Beer Lab and Long Beach Bread Lab with his wife, Harmony. “It’s a massive, very Long Beach story. It’s where Long Beach people try to uplift Long Beach businesses and brands.”
How Long Beach Beer Lab came to tackle the Sublime beer.
Long Beach Beer Lab is no stranger to collaborations or, more specifically, band beers. Two years ago, the brewery partnered with The Vandals to release a special Oktoberfest bier in their honor. (And yes, the band even appeared at the space, much to the glee of Levi and Harmony.) Joe Escalante—both the bassist and manager for The Vandals—became the manager for Sublime.
And with it, an offering Long Beach Beer Lab couldn’t refuse.
“It wasn’t remotely calculated,” Levi said. “I grew up in Long Beach in the ’90s. I lived and breathed 40 oz. to Freedom. If I could go back in time and tell my 16-year-old self I would be doing this, I wouldn’t believe it.”
A Sublime beer had already been made. But let’s be honest: it was always meant for Long Beach.
Yes, there was once a Sublime beer pushed out by San Diego’s AleSmith—not a Long Beach brewery. It was something I even lamented in a piece about it eight years ago: “San Diego’s AleSmith brewery will be honoring the debut of that album by creating a Sublime Mexican Lager, including a small batch of limited edition 40-ounce bottles for collectors. (We’ll really want to express our sorrows that a Long Beach brewery wasn’t given the option instead but alas…)” And Levi shares the same sentiment.
“I love AleSmith, but it never really sat right with me that a Sublime beer came out of San Diego,” Levi said. “Like, why not Beachwood? So I am glad to have brought that beer back. We wanted a Mexican lager, a brew that everyone could approach. It has kick-ass packaging. It’s got a great brand behind it. The liquid inside is gold-worthy. And it’s all made right here, where the sound is from and where it should have been made all along.”
Long Beach Beer Lab’s Sublime beer will not only be available at the brewery. Whole Foods, Lazy Acres, Bristol Farms, Total Wine, as well as all the ma’n’pa shops will carry cans of the lager.
The cultural impact of Sublime makes them more than worthy of their own beer.
They’ve never just been a Long Beach thing.
If you grew up in Southern California in the ’90s, Sublime wasn’t just a band—they were the soundtrack. When 40oz. to Freedom dropped, it didn’t just make waves—it rewired the region’s musical DNA. They pulled from the ska scene up in North OC, the punk energy of L.A., and the kaleidoscope of Long Beach’s sounds—reggae, jazz, R&B, Latin—and mashed it all into something unmistakably their own.
From 1988 until his passing in ’96, Bradley Nowell led Sublime with a grit that was pure DIY legend. Major labels wouldn’t bite, so he borrowed a thousand bucks from his dad, launched Skunk Records, and sold over 30,000 copies of 40oz. straight out of the van. Their videos were love letters to Long Beach—the rooftops of Belmont Shore’s Gaytonia building, alleyways, sidewalks, the sun-baked streets. Sublime didn’t just come from Long Beach—they put it on the map.
