Live will bring its reformed sound to South Florida on Tuesday.

The members of Live agree that the group’s latest CD, Songs From Black Mountain, represents a new era for the band.

That seems like an obvious enough observation. After all, it is the first CD the band has recorded under a new contract with Epic Records after a career-long, seven-CD run with Radioactive/MCA Records.

But to the band’s singer and chief songwriter, Ed Kowalczyk, the talk of a new era applies on a musical and fundamental level.

“I think it’s just the energy of the record,” Kowalczyk said in a recent phone interview. “There is a new sort of depth to the band, definitely to the music, that I sense. It’s sort of 100 percent uplifting now, but it’s an authentic kind of uplifting. It’s not that the record doesn’t have some deep, dark elements to it. It does have songs like ‘Show’ and ‘Where Do We Go From Here?’ which have much more of that existential sort of angst that people (read) into Live on Throwing Copper and all those records. It’s just with these songs like ‘The River’ and ‘Mystery,’ which I think are new moments for the band in some way, I think they signal a kind of change in the atmosphere of the band that’s really new.”

The freshness of the songs, Kowalczyk mentions, is apparent enough. “The River” opens Songs From Black Mountain on a warm note. The song evokes a romantic feeling in its images of a man and woman embracing and its idea of allowing love to ease one’s pain. The music matches that emotional tone. “The River” has a sound more textured, a bit lighter and more melodic than Live’s signature bracing guitar riffs and urgent rhythms (think of hits like “I Alone” or “Selling the Drama”).

In fact, Live imbues many of the tunes on Songs From Black Mountain with graceful melodies. “We went for some different guitar sounds,” Kowalczyk said. “We went for a cleaner, sort of more classic guitar sound, big guitars, but not necessarily the sort of compressed, crunched (sound) we were sort of typecast into. I would say the melodic strengths of the songwriting really pushed the production into a place that supported it maybe even better.”

Lyrically, Kowalczyk said, Songs From Black Mountain continues a shift toward a more direct, emotion-driven style of writing that had surfaced on such recent CDs as V and Birds of Pray. Although Live’s early songs were often considered brainy and abstract, the new CD uses romantic imagery as metaphors for spirituality and the feelings it can inspire.

“[Songwriting] was mostly a mental [process] early on, and it has become more of a spiritual, heart-driven one in these last four or five years,” Kowalczyk said.

The warmer, uplifting vibe and melodic richness of Songs From Black Mountain represents a welcome evolution for Live, a band that endured a startling popularity loss in recent years.

Live — which was formed in York, Pa., in 1985 by Kowalcyzk, guitarist Chad Taylor, bassist Patrick Dahlheimer and drummer Chad Gracey — debuted on the national scene in 1991 with the major-label EP Four Songs, followed by full-length release Mental Jewelry later that year.

Then, the band exploded onto the charts with Throwing Copper in 1994. Featuring the chart-topping singles “Selling the Drama,” “Lightning Crashes” and “I Alone,” the CD sold more than 12 million copies worldwide.

It’s been downhill ever since, as sales declined with each subsequent CD — 1997’s Secret Samadhi, 1999’s The Distance to Here, 2001’s V and 2003’s Birds of Pray, which sold only 275,000 copies.

Kowalczyk, who brushed aside a question about the reasons for the group’s falling popularity, seemed unconcerned with Live’s fortunes.

“I guess it’s just the ups and downs of the music business, the ins and outs,” he said. “Everybody’s experience is going to be unique, and ours is what it is. We’re in a new moment. I don’t really sit around and think about it too much.”

Instead, Kowalczyk is focusing on his rejuvenated band.

“I think we’ve stepped into a new energy as a band,” he said. “We’ve always had an energy, but I think it’s taken on a new dimension of depth and power. And these songs have really helped that along. These songs are so deep for me and so uplifting and reach right into people’s hearts, that combined with this incredible performance energy is really an amazing experience for people, and they’re telling us. It was what I hoped for and it’s also what people are getting, so that’s good.”

What: Live and Collective Soul Concert When: Sept. 25, 7 p.m. Where: Mizner Park Ampitheatre, 590 Plaza Real, Boca Raton Info: Call 561-750-1668 or visit Ticketmaster.com