Since the monumental album, Throwing Copper sold more than 12 million copies worldwide and launched Live onto the cover of Rolling Stone in 1994, the band has grown up and lightened up. Now they're fired up for a New Zealand tour in December to promote their new album, V. Lead singer/guitarist Ed Kowalczyk and bass player Patrick Dahlheimer spoke to Rebecca Barry.

I can't believe I finally found the key, the door, the trip, it was all in my mind. Now I'm one with the fools of love.
- Call Me A Fool, from the album V by Live.

Sixteen years, record sales in excess of 17 million and over a year's worth of touring later, Live happily proclaim on their new album, they are "pissin' in the mainstream". It's an ambiguous lyric considering V, as they've aptly called their fifth album, delivers a number of songs that have been readily accepted by the masses. Simple Creed, featuring lead singer and guitarist Ed Kowalczyk's newfound soulmate Tricky, plays high-rotate on popular radio. Forever May Not Be Long Enough has cropped up on the soundtrack for the B-grade Hollywood flick, The Mummy Returns. A remixed version of Deep Enough can be heard over the front title sequence of The Fast And The Furious. The piano laden Overcome has become an easily accessible anthem dedicated to the victims of the terrorist attacks on America.

But Live is not your usual in-one-end-and-out-the-other top 40 type of band. They play epic rock/pop songs that grapple with the deeper issues: spirituality, self-revelation, birth, rather than falling to the contemporary tendency to sing about teen frustration. "We have enough angst in our lives, do we really need to be reminded?" asks Live bass player Patrick Dahlheimer. "Always there has been an acknowledgement of our love, our history with R&B and hip hop music. I can remember when I was 13, listening to Grand Master Flash. I suppose if you wanted to qualify our new album, we're more street. We've got our feelers out more this time."

Perhaps that's why producers Glen Ballard and Michael Railo (who encouraged the band to use loops and samples) and Adam Duritz of Counting Crows, worked with the band on this album. And why Jane's Addiction is touring with Live in Toronto. Then of course there's the collaboration with Tricky, a man who would be surely squirming in his suede boots if ever described as mainstream. After Kowalczyk co-wrote and sang on Evolution, Revolution, Love for Tricky's 2001 album, Blowback, the gravelly-voiced icon of trip hop returned the favour. The recording took an hour.

"Tricky is a lot of fun, an amazing guy," says Kowalczyk. "His sensibilities are very similar to mine - our tastes are the same, especially musically. We spent far more time just hanging out. We're friends and we speak to each other every week."

'Fun' creeps into Kowalczyk's conversation more often these days. The quietly-spoken frontman who bursts into life on stage, is also well known for his faith in God and his intense interest in Eastern religion and the writings of Indian philosopher Jiddu Krishnamurti. It's an introspective muse that has in the past, been criticized as "Kmart mysticism", and eventually led to Kowalczyk becoming more laidback, as evident on V. "As a young man, I was very serious," he says. "I've since learnt to let go. The most personal song on V for me is Call Me A Fool. It's a statement about what happens to you when you give up the search, you find your creative."

Certainly, V is a more light-hearted approach to love than say, Secret Samadhi, a collection of songs about the anger and frustration the band were feeling towards the world at the time. "Samadhi was about what was happening in our lives. It was a darker record and we were freaking out as a way of dealing with everything," says Kowalczyk.

Whereas, on V's People Like You, for which the boys hypothetically urinate on the mass market, Kowalczyk dreams he is "standing on stage with Queen, Michael Stipe and Elton John, Bono and Springsteen, singin Hallelujah, rock and roll is king." But V also has spiritual overtones - on Overcome, he laments, "I am overcome, holy water in my lungs." On The Ride, he sings about his wish to escape the west where "money is all we care for now". "Cynicism is part of our way of life. It has dominated our music for the past five years," Kowalczyk explains.

They're not a band who have sat on their disheartened laurels however. Live are advocates of Tibetan freedom and have played a number of gigs for the cause. When Secret Samadhi was released in 1996, they commissioned rock artist David Fremont to design a limited edition tour poster, donating the proceeds to medical charities. They're also giving a portion of sales of V to aid in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks.

"Cynicism is fun but in the past it's been too dominant in our songs. It's for people who haven't had an outlet for deeper thinking. People demand more of their art these days."

It's as though he can sense the coming question. "Oh, and I didn't mind The Mummy Returns. I always like that kind of thing, I liked the Indiana Jones movies."

"That awful movie!" laughs Dahlheimer. "Yeah Forever was co-written with Glenn Ballard which is why we got involved, we just really wanted to work with him. It was written to feel middle eastern, especially for the movie. But as far as V goes, that was an experiment that just turned out very right. Ed went into the studio and next thing, he called up and said, these songs are turning out really well. It was amazing they were coming out of him so quickly. He and Chad Gracey would put down an idea and by the afternoon it would be finished. So we got back to work again. We were still touring for our last album, The Distance To Here."

While that album title is a reference to Live's journey to musical and spiritual freedom, it could also apply to their current living situation. Incredibly, Live all live in different parts of America, Kowalczyk in L.A., drummer Chad Gracey in Portland, Dahlheimer in Miami and lead guitarist Chad Taylor in Pennsylvania.

"We spend so much time together it doesn't really matter that we live apart," says Kowalcyzk. "I think we've all grown in different ways. In fact, we're all very different people. Chad Gracey is an aggressive, outdoors type of guy. He works out, climbs mountains, he's like a soldier with a regimented outlook on life, whereas I find the idea of lifting weights ridiculous. Why would you lift stuff you don't have to? Pat is the class clown and Chad Taylor our guitarist is very driven, focused and business-like. But our mission in life is the same. We're all very music focused."

Dahlheimer says the distance between them has in fact, sparked their creativity. "You lose some of that bonding, I mean, you don't meet for a beer. But we've become true to ourselves. It wouldn't be healthy for us to remain in the same home town. It just works well this way. We have a history, a chemistry and it sounds silly, but generally, I can envision how the others will contribute before we've even stepped in the studio. We read each other's minds."