Meet the Band: Miles Doughty (vocals, bass, guitar), Kyle McDonald (guitar, bass, vocals), Ryan "Rymo" Moran (drums), Oguer "OG" Ocon (percussion), Daniel "Dela" Delacruz (saxophone), Paul Wolstencroft (keyboards), Andy Geib (trumpet, trombone) and Karl Denson (saxophone)
Born in O.B.: The band formed in Ocean Beach, California in 1994. Doughty started the group when he was still in high school. He says watching old-school Motley Crue videos made him want to form a group. Bradley Nowell from Sublime then "discovered" the band and signed them to his Skunk Records; they've steadily recorded and toured ever since. "[Nowell] took us under his wing and let us record the first couple of records for his label," says Doughty via phone from a Dallas tour stop. "It's cool that someone you looked up to would take a chance on us. They showed us a lot in terms of recording. We'll be forever grateful. We met him at a club they played at and got him to come back to the pad where we had this recording equipment. We started jamming and became friends."
A Little Bit of Everything: The band has always played a wide range of music. "We play reggae, hip-hop, blues, funk, metal, whatever," says Doughty. "You can't really classify the band in any sort of genre. There's something for everybody at a Slightly Stoopid show. With every record, there's growth."
Why You Should Hear Them: The band's new album, Meanwhile... Back At the Lab, commences with the jazzy "Dabbington" and then embraces everything from funk to punk. "The Prophet," a song that Doughty wrote years ago with the late Nowell, could even pass as a Sublime tune as it mixes reggae, pop and rock. "It's just a song written back in the day," says Doughty when asked about the track. "It's about the struggles you see in the world growing up in the middle lower class and looking for a brighter future. It changed a little bit as we recorded for the new album. It changed to the times of how we are and where we are in our lives. A lot of the verses stayed the same. The song speaks for itself. It's a basic story about life and what it is. I was playing acoustic guitar on my couch and that chorus came up. I never got to finish recording the track and I thought it was time to finish it." The song's music video includes cameos from the band's influences and friends, including G-Love, Cypress Hill's B-Real and Sen Dog, Don Carlos, Fishbone's Angelo Moore, Sublime/Long Beach Dub Allstars' Marshall Goodman, tattoo artist Opie Ortiz and MMA athlete Nate Diaz.
Where You Can Hear Them: slightlystoopid.com
Where You Can See Them: Slightly Stoopid performs with Dirty Heads and the Expendables at 6:30 p.m. on Saturday, Sept. 5, at Jacobs Pavilion at Nautica.
