Slightly Stoopid performing in 2014
Paul Wellman (file)

“You can never dream [up] this kind of stuff,” said Miles Doughty, reflecting on the two decades of success his band Slightly Stoopid has achieved. In 1994, Doughty and his friends Kyle McDonald and Adam Bausch cofounded the genre-bashing ensemble — which fuses myriad musical styles, including rock, reggae, blues, and punk — while attending high school in Ocean Beach, just north of San Diego. One year later, Sublime’s lead singer, the late Bradley Nowell, heard them play and signed them to his label, Skunk Records. Since then, Stoopid has played sold-out shows all over the world, touring with such venerable groups as the Dave Matthews Band, Snoop Dogg, and G. Love & Special Sauce, to name a few. In 2011, Stoopid joined the Grateful Dead’s Bob Weir for a live performance at the legendary singer/guitarist’s TRI Studios.

Ranked one of 2017’s best summer touring bands by Pollstar, Slightly Stoopid is set to have another explosive summer. On the road for its School’s Out for Summer tour, the band is marking 20-plus years of its existence and the release of its ninth studio album, Everyday Life, Everyday People, which drops July 13. Stoopid has a massive roster of gigs taking it all over the country, including a stop in Santa Barbara on Sunday, June 24, at the Bowl. “We’ll probably play four to six tracks from the new record,” said Doughty in a recent interview with the Independent. The following are snippets from our phone conversation.

In 2017, you toured all over the world. Did you have any favorite places, favorite moments? Surfing in Australia was amazing. They have some perfect waves. The people in South America go crazy for music. Touring with the band is just, overall, a lot of fun. I get to hang out with my best friends all over the world.

What was it like playing with Bob Weir? It was amazing. We got to jam a couple times. It’s one of those dreams come true. [The Dead] kinda set the tone for how you tour. We learned a lot from him. Part of that is we just have fun with it. We have the best time in the world.

What inspired this newest album, Everyday Life, Everyday People? Life is the inspiration. All of us are what make life beautiful, and it takes all of us to make the world that way. The album’s our vision of what our world’s like today.

Having grown up in Ocean Beach, do you feel a relationship between the band and the beach? Yeah, of course. There’s a certain type of vibe with the beach that we also have in our music. The band was born by the beach, so it naturally found its way into our music.

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Slightly Stoopid plays Sunday, June 24, 5:30 p.m., at the Santa Barbara Bowl (1122 N. Milpas St.). Call 962-7411 or visit sbbowl.com.

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