The thinking man's headbangers in Live aren't sure whether to call their show Friday at The Majestic Ventura Theatre a debut or not. It's possible that they played there before, and it's possible that they haven't. Whatever they decide, they'll be selling a new CD, "Radiant Sea: A Collection of Bootleg Rarities and Two New Songs."

All the way from York, Pa., Live dispenses decibels that can reach cat-scaring intensity, but there's more going on than the typical fist-in-the-air hard rock scenario. Frontman Ed Kowalcyzk, who sings and writes and doesn't look a day over 9,050, seems to be having a blast with his boyhood musical mates as they lead their audience on a search for truth, justice and understanding.

It's been blue skies and green lights since the band's second album, "Throwing Copper" (1994), sold more than 7 million copies. Now Live drives around and plays emotional shows for fans and their "cool uncles," performing hits like "Selling the Drama," "Lightning Crashes" and "I Alone."

The K-Man took time out to talk. He has obviously been interviewed before.

Hey, Ed, ever been to the Ventura Theatre?

We were trying to figure that out. If we had, it was so long ago that none of us can quite remember it.

So, closing in on 20 years with the band think you might stick with it?

It's looking that way. We started the band when we were 13 years old, so it has been like a family. It comes down to the fact that we really enjoy making music together. I think the day we don't enjoy it anymore, we don't do it, but it doesn't look like that's going to happen anytime soon.

There's a great line in your biography about how you — and all of us — are really 10,000 years old.

I think I said that mainly because I felt that when you are born in this world, you get a fresh start, but at the same time, you get a lot of information that takes a long time to develop. It's part of your culture and upbringing, and that's good and bad. As much as you benefit from it, it's also a limitation as to how you view the world. I've always been into meditation, trying to break those boundaries and experience things that are creative and fresh. I think that's one of the reasons I enjoy what I do as a musician. It's all about pushing your boundaries and experiencing new things.

You guys have been touted as the new U2 — U3 even — but also get written up in headbanger rags like Kerrang!. What do you suppose Live's particular niche is?

I think what's unique about Live, and why our fans are still interested, is the lyrics. From the beginning, it's been about trying to find the core of who I was and having music in my life to assist me in that search. The idea was that music could entertain, but also cause you to think and feel more deeply about the world you live in.

When you first got started in all this, what was the dream compared with the present reality?

Oh, it's exceeded everything I dared imagine. When you start out — especially as young as we were — the dreams were bigger than the reality for a while, but that was the whole power of it. Even though we didn't know what we were doing, we had something special, and if we could just keep mining it, we'd be all right. We've been gone all over the world, had some hits and still play fun shows to lots of people, so it's working.

Who goes to a Live show?

There were moments in the '90s when you could peg our fan base: college-age kids and the MTV demographic. As we grew up, we started seeing those people growing up with us, but we were also seeing older people — I like to call them the "cool uncle" or "cool big brother" fans — who had probably never seen a video of Live on MTV. We're 36 years old, so sometimes when we play and the fans are 20 years old, we wonder how they found out about us. I think the Internet changed that a lot.

So your new CD is some sort of bootleg?

It was really off the cuff. We decided to take it on tour and sell it, bringing back our label we had when we were little kids. It's kind of a hodgepodge — songs from the cutting-room floor, B-sides and songs thrown together on the road. It was for the fans, and not really "Hey, this is our next album," but more of a grab bag.

Any advice for the next generation?

Stay true to what you're doing; find the part of you that's original, and don't take "no" for an answer. I think the temptations are greater than ever for artists to compromise to get a deal or on the radio. But now, as things are changing in the music industry, I think there are a lot more opportunities and reasons to stay true to what you're doing. If it's a bit left of center, stay left of center because nobody really knows where everything is heading.

— E-mail music writer Bill Locey at blocey@pacbell.net.