Blues Traveler spent the summer showcasing music from "North Hollywood Shootout," which surfaced Aug. 26 and marked the group's debut on the Verve Forecast label. The set was produced by Grammy-winner David Bianco (Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers, Ozzy Osbourne), who helped the bandmates venture outside of their creative comfort zone and capture their spontaneous jam-band spirit on the recording.

"On the last few records, we concentrated so much on the crafting of the songwriting and arrangements that we started losing some of the live spontaneity that the five of us created onstage," guitarist Chan Kinchla explained in a statement. "So on this album, instead of doing the usual pre-production process, where we really worked out the songs before taking them into the studio, we decided to go straight into the studio and do songwriting there. We recorded all the parts as we were working them out, and then built the songs from there."

That was a completely new way of working for Blues Traveler, Kinchla added.

"For a long time, we thought of the studio as a completely different creative process than playing live because we've never had much luck in trying to incorporate the stuff we do live onto a record. But this time, all the live improvisation we were doing in the studio inspired the songs."

The album's lead single, "You Me and Everything," is streaming at BT's MySpace page.

During its more than 20-year career, Blues Traveler has amassed a body of work that includes eight studio albums and four live discs, as well as worldwide sales topping 10 million units, according to the group's bio.