Slightly Stoopid with Stick Figure

Slightly Stoopid is eight studio albums into its career with its newly released CD, “Meanwhile … Back at the Lab.” But the band doesn’t mind giving fans a reminder — this time a jarring one — of how things started for the group all those years ago.

Smack in the middle of “Meanwhile … Back at the Lab,” after seven songs that touch on the laid-back Southern California-styled mix of reggae, funk, soul and rock that has come to be Slightly Stoopid’s stock in trade, the group unleashes a ­blistering, guitar heavy three-minute blast of pure punk rock. The song is so different from the previous songs that it makes one wonder whether some different band hijacked the album.

Miles Doughty feels the song, whose lyrics and title contain profanity, has an important function on “Meanwhile … Back at the Lab.”

“I felt like it was more of a statement, just saying ‘Look, just because we’re playing jammy kind of music, reggae, blues, rock, hip-hop, just because we’re playing that stuff, doesn’t mean that we don’t remember our punk rock roots’,” Doughty said in a late June phone interview. Slightly Stoopid is making a stop at The Cuthbert Amphitheater on Saturday.

There’s been a taste of punk rock on several recent Slightly Stoopid albums, either by incorporating an element of punk as one of several styles in a tune or as on the 2005 album “Closer to the Sun,” by including the punk song “Nothin’ Over Me.” But one won’t hear Slightly Stoopid mentioned in the same sentence with California punk rock bands like NOFX, the Adolescents or Pennywise.

Instead, Slightly Stoopid is now known as one of the trailblazers of what has become one of the most popular alt-rock subgenres to emerge over the past two decades — SoCal-styled reggae-rock.

Slightly Stoopid is one of several bands in that genre that can now headline outdoor amphitheaters, enjoying a level of popularity that seemed like a pipe dream when the group followed bands like Sublime and 311 onto the scene.

“Sublime really kind of set that tone for everybody really, when they blew up, that whole movement. Really, back in the day it was Sublime, 311, and we were like the baby band,” Doughty said.

Sublime and its late vocalist, Bradley Nowell, in fact, gave Slightly Stoopid its biggest early break. Nowell signed Slightly Stoopid to his label, Skunk Records, paving the way for the release of the group’s 1996 self-titled debut album.

At that point, Slightly Stoopid still had a lot of punk in its sound, while Sublime was on the cusp of both its commercial breakthrough and tragic end. Nowell died on May 25, 1996, just two months before the release of its self-titled third album, which featured the chart-topping alternative rock song, “What I Got.”

One of the key pieces of advice Slightly Stoopid got from Sublime was to get on the road and tour, tour and tour some more. Doughty and McDonald took that advice to heart.

“We toured for 10 years, grinding it out, trying to push that sound out,” he said.

“A lot of these younger bands, they don’t have to tour that long because that vibe is out there. It’s kind of like that groundwork was laid and they don’t have to tour as hard as the bands did back in the day.”

Over the years, as the touring miles piled up, Slightly Stoopid added band members. Today, the lineup includes Doughty, McDonald (guitar, bass, vocals), Ryan Moran (drums), Oguer Ocon (percussion, harp), Daniel “Dela” Delacruz (saxophone), Paul Wolstencroft (keyboards) and Andy Geib (trombone), with special guest Karl Denson (saxophone) often touring with the group. The band also kept recording albums that saw the group’s sound evolve and expand considerably over time.

It’s easy to visualize fans dancing and grooving to the songs during the warm evenings at Slightly Stoopid concerts this summer, and Doughty says the group is indeed adding new tunes into its live set.

“Well, we’re definitely in the summer going to start playing some tracks off of the new album,” he said. “This will be our eighth record, so we’re going to have eight records to choose from with songs. We’ll mix in a little bit of the old, old in between and try to sprinkle in like five or six songs from the new album during the show. I think it’s going to be good.” - Alan Sculley