Tropidelic returns home, celebrates new album release

March 26, 2015 at 12:05a.m.

Having survived an awesome two-week run on the road with Sublime cover band Badfish, Kent-based group Tropidelic is back home to celebrate the release of its new studio album, “Police State.”

“We’ve played a lot with Badfish around Ohio, Pennsylvania and New York over the past five or six years,” said Tropidelic singer Matthew Roads. “This is the first time we went south.”

The tour included memorable and packed gigs at major venues in Key West, St. Petersburg, Orlando, Jacksonville and Myrtle Beach.

“It was amazing and incredible,” Roads said. “They’re a high-tiered touring act, and they bring large numbers wherever they play.”

Over the past decade, Tropidelic is becoming known for its energetic reggae, funk and jam stylings. In addition to opening for Badfish, the outfit has shared the stage with Slightly Stoopid, 311, Pepper, The Dirty Heads, Sublime with Rome, Soja and The Wailers, as well as appeared at both the Warped Tour and Bamboozle Festival.

Regarding “Police State,” the new album not only acts as the follow-up to 2012’s “All Heads Unite,” but also marks the album debut of the band’s recently added horn section that adds a P-Funk vibe to the Tropidelic sound.

Favorite new songs in the mix include the ska-influenced title track, as well as folk-jam song “Look Forward.” The former was written after the band’s rehearsal space was raided last May by police, while the latter incorporates a hip-hop flavor.

“This is our first album with the horn section, so it’s a bigger, kind of funky sound,” Roads said. “It’s our most focused release production-wise with the sound engineering, mixing, mastering. More work went into this than any other project. We just cranked it out in two months to have it ready for this tour.”

Another reason why Tropidelic — Roads (vocals), James Begin (trombone), Bobby Chronic (guitar), Darrick Willis (drums), Casey Williams (percussion), Todd Marshall (bass), Tim Younessi (sax) and Derek McBryde (trumpet) — is changing its vibes has to do with growing pains. Hence the decision to add a horn section to an already large band.

“It’s an entirely different premise for everything,” Roads said. “I think if you’re really serious about what you’re doing, you’re constantly forcing yourself through all kinds of [stuff] to do something like this. This is almost a completely reinvention with this group and its turnover.

“So it’s a totally different thing entirely, and it’s progress.”

Fans will get to hear that progress when Tropidelic returns to Youngstown on Friday for a CD release show at Cedars West End.

At the very least, it appears as though Tropidelic is expanding its longitude and latitude with an upward trajectory toward possible stardom.

“Absolutely,” Roads said. “I’m all-in at this point, and everything has been progressing steadily for quite a long time. Things are looking good.”