Maroon 5 isn’t cashing in on its success.

 

When Maroon 5 released the lead single off its latest CD, it was no surprise the song, “Makes Me Wonder,” zoomed up the Billboard magazine Hot 100 singles chart.

 

In fact, it made the biggest leap of any single in that chart’s history, going from No. 64 to No. 1 in a single week in late April.

 

The new CD, It Won’t Be Soon Before Long, enjoyed a similar response upon its late May release, debuting at No. 1 on Billboard’s album chart and already selling more than 1 million copies.

 

Considering Maroon 5’s 2002 debut CD, Songs About Jane, produced three hit singles and sold more than 10 million copies worldwide (4 million in the United States), the emphatic, immediate response was easy to predict.

 

Somehow, though, the members of Maroon 5 weren’t taking that kind of out-of-the-box success for granted. In an early September conference call interview with reporters, both guitarist James Valentine and singer Adam Levine sounded as if they had been fully prepared for It Won’t Be Soon Before Long to make a much smaller splash, particularly since Songs About Jane took a long time to catch on.

 

“I think it [the ­gradual success] was because we just take a very classic approach to songcraft, and I think that’s sort of lacking in a lot of music today,” Valentine said. “And I think those sort of songs take longer to really seep into the public’s consciousness. I think that’s why it took so long for Songs About Jane and even like our singles [to take hold].”

 

Songs About Jane didn’t really peak until two years after its release. It was certified platinum in the United States in January 2004, after “Harder to Breathe” and “This Love” had become hit singles, and accelerated further with the August 2004 release of “She Will Be Loved,” a top five single on Billboard’s Hot 100 chart.

 

Perhaps the members of Maroon 5 didn’t bank on the immediate success of It Won’t Be Soon Before Long because they have had more experience with the ups and downs of the music business than many people realize.

 

Levine, keyboardist Jesse Carmichael, bassist Mickey Madden and drummer Ryan Dusick (who left Maroon 5 because of ongoing arm and shoulder injuries and was replaced by Matt Flynn) were in a band called Kara’s Flowers that was signed to Warner Bros. The group’s 1997 straight-ahead pop-rock CD, The Fourth World, bombed —Billboard reported it sold just 5,000 copies.

 

It was only after several months apart that the guys reconvened, discovered an R&B dimension in the songwriting and renamed the group (with Valentine joining on guitar) Maroon 5.

 

In fact, Levine said, despite the huge sales of its debut album, Maroon 5 is far more concerned with establishing itself as an enduring act than getting rich from the group’s current popularity.

 

“We don’t want to burn out, and there’s definitely this mentality that’s very strong these days about cashing in, and we’re much more interested in longevity,” Levine said. “We want to be taken seriously as a band, and there are things that you need to do in order to make that happen.

 

“I think that at the end of the day, it comes down to one thing, which is writing good music, writing music that people can connect with,” he said.

 

It took the Los Angeles-based band about a year to finish It Won’t Be Soon Before Long, a solid follow-up that incorporates the melodic pop and R&B sound that worked so well on its debut album. The CD includes several grooving, catchy and immediately appealing tracks, such as “Makes Me Wonder,” “Wake Up Call” (the new single) and “Won’t Go Home Without You,” the song both Levine and Valentine predicted to be the CD’s blockbuster single. With its smooth sound, the ballad “Goodnight Goodnight” seems like a natural successor to “She Will Be Loved.”

 

“The only conscious thing that we really went into the studio thinking was that we definitely wanted some more up-tempo songs because we felt that our (live) set lacked that,” Valentine said.

 

Both Levine and Valentine agree that the new songs make for a stronger set list. As for the show itself, Levine said fans can expect the group’s music to take center stage.

 

“We don’t want there to be too many bells and whistles because we don’t want to detract from the music,” he said. “That’s obviously really important to us. We’re going to stretch out our show a little bit and do things that we didn’t do last time.”

 

Maroon 5 will perform at 8 p.m. Saturday at the BankAtlantic Center, One Panther Parkway, Sunrise. For tickets and information, call 305-358-5885 or visit www.ticketmaster.com.