Slightly Stoopid

Moe:

Sitting backstage with Miles from Slightly Stoopid. Miles, thanks a lot for being here man.

Miles:

Yeah man, it’s good to be here! I love Chicago.

Moe:

Man, I gotta say… Are you wearing those sunglasses ’cause you got a little Chronchitis or what? You hiding ‘em? (Laughs)

Miles:

Yeah. (Laughs) That’s how I roll, you know. We always roll with the red-eye.

Moe:

When’s the album coming out? Is it this week?

Miles:

It comes out the 7th, yeah. I think it’s like four days.

Moe:

Yeah, I heard some of the tracks from it. It’s badass.

Miles:

Thanks man. We’re stoked. We got to work with a lot of cool cats too. It’s pretty sweet.

Moe:

Mario C!

Miles:

Yeah. The name says itself, you know what I mean. I mean, that guy’s legendary. So it was pretty awesome to work with him. We got to work with Money Mark too, from the Beasties. And Paul Leary from the Butthole Surfers. Miguel from Sublime, and Chris D. from the G. Love crew.

Moe:

How was the influence with working with the guys from the Beasties? Were you guys going more towards a little more beats?

Miles:

No, it actually… We kinda wanted to roll with just a different vibe, you know what I mean. That was for us, we always try to make every record different. And obviously we’ve been a fan of the Beasties since we were younger so… I mean those guys were legendary you know. Mario C, it came to the table where we could work together, and we jumped at the opportunity. He’s a very chill-cat too. I mean, one of the most chillinest producers I’ve ever met. So it was pretty sweet.

Moe:

Did you put a (Mario C) “You can’t front on that…” little byte in there? (Laughs)

Miles:

No, we didn’t put that in there… (Laughs) But I mean it was really cool. We did get to work with a lot of really cool beat stuff and he does have a lot of cool ideas. So he really let us just do our thing and he kinda added his little presence in the mixing. So it was pretty cool.

Moe:

You guys work with a lot of guest artists right?

Miles:

Yeah.

Moe:

Like G. Love…from Philly… That’s where we’re from…

Miles:

Oh, you’re from Philly? Nice! G. Love’s my boy!

Moe:

Who you guys are going on tour with…

Miles:

Summer Haze…

Moe:

Leaving tomorrow right?

Miles:

Yeah, it’s tomorrow it starts, Costa Mesa.

Moe:

With Ozomatli, and …

Miles:

Yeah, Ozomatli, G. Love, that’s gonna be sweet.

Moe:

So how’d you and G. hook up?

Miles:

Well, we’ve been friends for about eight years, so… It’s been pretty cool. One of the guys in their crew got a hold of our Acoustic Roots record and he played it for G. Love and G. Love was just ‘Yo, what’s up with these cats?’ And then we started talking, and we became friends and started touring a little bit and did some studio…

Moe:

Surfing?

Miles:

We haven’t surfed together, but we done some serious partying together.

Moe:

You guys don’t party do you? (Laughs) No, I’m kidding…

Miles:

No, I don’t really party. I’m G-Rated! (Laughs)

Moe:

Me neither. (Laughs)

Miles:

(Laughs)

Moe:

But you got G. Love… You got Angelo… Angelo Moore from Fishbone.

Miles:

Yeah. Angelo is incredible. That guy’s one of the greatest voices that I’ve ever heard, really.

Moe:

High-energy…

Miles:

Yeah, I mean, he’s amazing. We were very privileged to play with them. It was kinda crazy, like seven or eight years ago, we went on a tour with them, opening up for them, and they were releasing a new record at the time, it was like their comeback kinda tour, then like a year and a half ago they came on tour with us, it was kinda like a full-circle thing. And for us, it was just like, Norwood, Angelo, I mean these guys…

Moe:

Did he break out the theremin?

Miles:

Oh yeah, he always has it. He’s a cool-cat, man. He came down to the studio for this record, you know, he’s always got his top-hat on, his suit…

Moe:

Oh I know… Crazy…

Miles:

Yeah, he’s just really a cool guy to work with man, so it’s nice.

Moe:

Going towards this record, does it seem like your going back to the roots? Going more organic?

Miles:

I think for us it’s like, the most important thing for us is the sound has either gotta be evolving or just different, you know. If you listen to any one of our records, none of them sound the same. For us it’s just like, as musicians and as people, we don’t wanna play just one style of music. We like it all. And we have so many different influences within the band because, you know, we got jazz guys, we got blues, you know, so everybody is kinda, presents everything to the table. It’s a mellower record, but I think it’s like the Acoustic Roots, but with the full band.

Moe:

Nice, yeah, I dug the Acoustic Roots album.

Miles:

Thanks man, I appreciate it.

Moe:

Yeah definitely. You guys got signed by one of the people you grew up listening to, right?

Miles:

Yeah, we got signed by Brad when we were like sixteen.

Moe:

And you got signed to Skunk right?

Miles:

Yeah, Skunk Records.

Moe:

How was it hanging out with those guys?

Miles:

It was cool, man. You know, we were friends. So it was nice, you know. Brad would come over the house, we’d jam, acoustic guitars, record stuff at the pad… He really kinda opened the door for us to get our foot in there, you know what I’m saying. Without that I don’t know what would have really happened. We’ve always been a band, a hard-working, touring band, and he kinda really made it so people would go ‘Hey, take a look at these guys.’ And through the Skunk name, people were like ‘Okay let’s check these guys out.’ And through constant, just two hundred days a year traveling, we’ve been able to turn that into a success. So it’s been nice.