What's so funny about peace, love and understanding? Absolutely nothing, according to Live frontman Ed Kowalczyk, who leads the "all you need is love" revolution on the quartet's new album, The Distance to Here, due out Oct. 5.| "There's gotta be some hope out there, and we as four people are pretty hopeful guys," explains Kowalczyk. "It's who we are and I just wanted to make a record that communicated that to people. I have a feeling the world needs that right now."

Kowalczyk says he came up with the cryptic album title because "it just kinda had a zen quality that I liked. I just kind of threw some words together and said, 'I like that,'" he says. "And then it started to take on its own life 'cause I started to kind of put it into context, put this record into our career, where we've been and where we are now.

"There's all sorts of stuff I wanna say generally about love and positivity and do it in an intense way," he adds. "And that's likening itself more back to our first album [1991's Mental Jewelry], which was very positive, sort of like, 'let's question everything. Let's burn it all down. Let's figure out what the hell is going on.' There is more of that energy [on the new album] but we're better songwriters. We're veteran road dudes. We play effortlessly. Back then it was much harder." The Distance to Here will be the band's first release since Secret Samadhi, released nearly two and a half years ago.

The York, Penn., vets let some of their skills rub off on new arrivals Michael Railton (Rusted Root, General Public) and Ed's brother Adam, who contribute organ and guitar, respectively, to the new album. "He plays just like me, it's weird," says Ed, regarding his brother, who, with Railton, will join the band on tour, allowing Ed to roam free on stage.

Kowalczyk says the sound on the new album is "simple but grand." "[Producer] Jerry Harrison's and my goal was to showcase the four players stronger than ever and then add things that were simple and organic but also did exactly what they needed to do," he says. For Distance the group wrote fifty songs but only recorded twenty.

Lyrically, Kowalczyk says, "I really wanted a record that harkens back to the roots of rock & roll. I pulled a lot of influences, more than ever, from the late Sixties 'cause I really feel like this time -- even though we don't have Vietnam like they had to rally around -- we do have psychological warfare in this country and a sort of existential pain that could use a great rock record to rally around and a band like Live to shove some love in everyone's face and keep questioning things."

The Distance to Here's first single, "The Dolphin's Cry," will go to radio in late August or early September.

BLAIR R. FISCHER(June 2, 1999)