NEWPORT — State Radio is the latest project of singer and guitarist Chad Urmston, formerly of the Vermont-based jam legends Dispatch. And while there were some jam-worthy moments last night at the Snapple Sunset Music Festival, the Boston-based trio’s trademark is a shaggy mix of the bounce and song structures of reggae with the clangor of rock, all topped off with politically charged lyrics to take advantage of the irresistible groove.

Sure, there were the precise unisons during a long drum roll, and a long guitar solo, in “Calvados Chopper,” and nutty unison riffs in the single “Wicker Plane,” but the jam ethos took a back seat to traditional compositions, Urmston’s lilting voice, whose speed and diction frequently emulated Jamaican toasting, and three-part harmony vocals.

There were also moments where the tempos borrowed from ’80s hardcore, though even then Urmston never completely switched over with distorted guitar chords, so the schizoid reggae/hardcore heaviness of, say, Bad Brains never materialized, mostly to the good.

The lyrics are part of the deal with State Radio, whether it be the draft-resister “Camilo” (“Is blood money just money to you?”), the antiwar “Calvados Chopper” (“What’s another war when it’s not your children?”) or even the delightfully smutty food-sex connections of “The Diner Song” (all from last year’s Us Against the Crown album). And some of that was missing last night. Given the overall clangor of the band, the vocals were up about as high as they’re going to go, and on more impressionistic stuff such as “Wicker Plane,” that was fine. But while the sunny melodicism always came across, it often wasn’t enough to make the bite of the lyrics distinct for neophytes, particularly on more rock-oriented songs such as “Mr. Larkin,” in which a dishwasher begs for his job.

Still, the faithful didn’t mind last night, whether it was the anthemic minor-key ska of the encore “Rushian” or the surprise second encore (the house lights had already been turned on) of “Gunship Politico,” a roots-reggae workout that saw Urmston drop his guitar and toast with hands free to high-five.

Cranston’s Monty Are I have spent much of the past year on the road, and their opening set showed it — the songs from last year’s Wall of People disc are in their bones.

Evolving from a hard and heavy ska outfit to a sleek modern-rock group, Monty is led by the radio-ready voices and crunching guitars of Steve Aiello and Ryan Muir. Punk emotionalism mixed well with progressive riffing that evoked a classical-metal hybrid, particularly on “In This Legacy” and “Tie Off Your Veins.” At the same time, touches such as Andrew Borstein’s keyboard intro to “Metropolis,” Borstein and Muir’s horns (a remnant from their ska days) on “O Brother,” and the plucked-string keys of “The Dublin Waltz” were distinctive and lent depth. And the dynamics of “Metropolis” and the anthemic chorus of “Between the Sheets,” among other highlights, showed that the group’s potential is huge.

rmassimo@projo.com