Sounds like quite a clever approach to the live gig, but it's par for the course for a group that made its mark doing impromptu concerts at odd stops all around the country on a fully equipped pop-up stage atop their bus. Hailed by critics as one of the most innovative and independent bands in America, Sonic Joyride became the stuff of grass roots legends upon the 1997 release of Bazaar, when their unique rolling road show attracted the attention of, among others, MTV, CNN, Billboard, Musician, and hundreds of local newspapers and television shows.

The music and lyrics on Behemoth reflect the amazing, soul-stirring changes in both the bands and lead singer/guitarist Chris Hobler's life this past year. Hobler's wife had their first child, son Aidan, and drummer Ken Tondre had to quit to battle a serious medical condition (Matt Scurfield now sits behind the kit). On a songwriting level, there is a lot of self-exploration going on here," Hobler says. "Bringing a child into the world imparts a certain truth to your life. So many wonderful changes occur when you begin to see the world through your child's eyes. There was a sudden clarity and purpose in my life and this made me more honest as a writer. Rather than intellectualize things or create fiction, I was digging much deeper into my own heart. The playing by [bassist] Rick Reese, [session drummer] Jonathan Mover and me is incredibly clean, and my production much more stripped down and honest. There's a tremendous amount of creative growth going on."

The title of the album Behemoth was testament to the large scale of that growth as well as a tongue-in-cheek ode to Sonic Joyride's original touring vehicle - a gas guzzling 1976 Ford Econoline van. The same combined sense of soul searching and wistful humor characterizes the tunes on the album. Combining gritty rock energy with trip hop and ambient flavors, "Is Anybody Out There?" talks about the magic of two lonely people meeting and believing love is possible. "Behind the Glass" is a rolling funk-rocker about the struggles a broken heart faces in letting go. "Everything is Beautiful" is an edgy, percussive ode to spiritual optimism in the face of the largely tragic world we live in, a theme continued more specifically on the cool and atmospheric "Starting Over", and "Don't Ask Why," which urges us to "just believe in the miracles raining down from the sky."

Don't get the idea that Hobler is all sunny optimism on a 24/7 basis. After exploring human potential on the blistering "Whatever You Want To Be," he lambastes the politicians who have fed us "B.S." - an angry rant tempered by psychedelic sound effects and a hypnotic bass and drum groove. Other topics include the grind of daily life ("Modern Day Galahad"), the possibility of being happy with what you have (the industrial, trip-hoppy rocker "Outside My Window"), the thin line between love and hate ("Move"), love's often intense disillusion (the alternately crunchy and ambient "Never") and, finally, a hilarious ode to the perfect modern man on the retro-flavored rocker "Duplication Man."

Sonic Joyride is essentially the longtime collaboration of Hobler and Reese, who began playing together in 1989 while Reese was attending the Berklee College of Music. Their first band was Spamparis, a Boston based four piece unit which released a well received self-titled disc in 1992. By 1993, Spamparis had been named a semi-finalist in Musician Magazine's "Best Unsigned Band" competition and was dubbed one of the ten best unsigned bands in the city by Boston Magazine's "The Best of Boston" awards. The following year, Hobler and Reese left Spamparis and Boston for a woodsy life in New Hampshire and the pursuit of a more inventive, avant garde music style. Sonic Joyride's 1995 debut received airplay on 180 college stations and gave them the opportunity to open concerts for Spin Doctors, Letters to Cleo, The Radiators, Ratt, and the Fabulous Thunderbirds.

Then came a lot of major label interest, a lot of potential compromising and eventually, the idea for the Cosmic Sled, surely a future piece of indie rock folklore. "It's interesting the way we captured people's imaginations," says Hobler. "Rather than sit home and complain about how hard it was to get the right deal and break through all the difficult aspects of the music industry, we just went out and played. There was a relaxed, un-commercial vibe that people seemed to be hungry for."

For that tour and the subsequent one, promoting 1999's Breathe (30,000 miles, 240 dates), Sonic Joyride left their home base of Milton Mills, New Hampshire and took off on a self-financed voyage to the American heartland, setting up and playing for locals at some of the country's most unusual landmarks - from the World's Largest Ball of Twine in Cawker City, Kansas to the World's Largest Bug outside Providence, RI.

Documenting the tour with "digital dailies" on the band's website, www.sonicjoyride.com, the band functioned like what Neil Diamond once described in "Brother Love's Traveling Salvation Show." The bus has it all - stage and set mounted on the roof, video screens, a 10,000-watt sound system, concert lighting system and fully functional 16 track digital recording studio - and Sonic Joyride was excited to play for whoever showed up, whether the crowd was a thousand or just a few angry policemen trying to shut them down.

But, reach the people they did..... as years of hard work began paying off. The band's increasing popularity and growth in airplay around the country - last year's single, "You'll Never Know," reached #84 on the national rock radio charts - has inspired SONIC JOYRIDE to intensify their independent ways.