NASHVILLE, TN. (Sawyer Brown Official Website) - As
Sawyer Brown - long known as "the hardest working band in country music" - criss-crossed the nation, blowing up audiences from coast-to-coast, one thing became apparent: people really threw themselves hard at the band and their music. It was a perspective Mark Miller had never really considered - and it made him take a long look at the way he made records.
"There was always another single, another album to record - and we fell into doing the things we always knew how to do," admits the man with more moves than anyone this side of Mick Jagger. "But when you see the different ways people respond to 'The Walk' and 'The Dirt Road' versus 'Some Girls Do' and 'Hard To Say,' you realize the fans really personalize how these songs fit their lives.
"Once we broke the recording cycle, it kind of set us free from any sort of timeline... and it also made me realize, if we were gonna do another record, it should be something that digs a little deeper, pushes a little further and maybe offers something more. So, three years later, we finally started putting the finishing touches on this album."
This album would be Keep Your Hands To Yourself, an exuberant intersection of Sawyer Brown's tilt-a-whirl full glory tempo ravers and the more reflective ballads that open up the turning points in people's lives hits stores on May 17th.
"It's the day of the Academy of Country Music Awards," Miller explains. "And that's the place where we won our very first Vocal Group of the Year Award, so it kind of makes this return even more perfect for us. There are, after all, some things in your career that're pretty important to you - and that was one."
Anchored by the utterly combustive "Mission Temple Fireworks Stand," a Paul Thorn/Billy Maddox song featuring sacred steel sensation Robert Randolph - which is in turbo-rotation on CMT, Keep Your Hands To Yourself walks the line and evolves the 5-man band from Apopka, Florida's high energy, plain dirt sensibility to a deeper place.
Whether it's a revved-up take on The Georgia Satellites' now classic swagger'n'want-to-bravado anthem that serves as the title track - and evokes the spirited former SB revisitations of George Jones' "The Race Is On" and Dave Dudley's "Six Days On The Road" - or the contemplative case of compassion without the details "They Don't Understand," this is everything Sawyer Brown does best. But there are some serious departures, ranging from the wink'n'nudge humor of the metaphoric love song "Tarzan & Jane," the chugging fervor of "Ole Kentuck," the dignified resolution of "I Will Not Be Broken" - and the nakedly romantic "All I Want Is You."
"The more we play for our fans - often second generation Sawyer Brown fans, who got turned onto the band by their older brothers and sisters, aunts or uncles, even their parents - the more we realize they'll let us open up new horizons, go different places," says Miller beaming. "They want to see what we're capable of musically, lyrically, which really challenged me when we were picking the songs. They deserve the best of what this band is, and that raised the bar quite a bit - cause I KNOW how good these guys are. So, in the end, we needed to figure out just how far we could push ourselves."
Having snuck on the Billboard Country Singles chart - at No 55 - from a leak last year, "Mission Temple" picks up steam at radio this week. Look for it to hits the charts - and for SB to hit the Opry at the Ryman on Feb. 5, then head to Mardi Gras for the Krewe of Orpheus Parade and Orpheuscade Feb 7.
