Dave Matthews has long been touted as one of the hardest-working guys in the music business. With yet another extensive summer tour and the follow-up to 2005's "Stand Up" in the works, it looks like he's living up to that description.

It's hard to believe that the Dave Matthews Band, which grossed $57 million in 2005 from touring North America and has consistently placed among the five top-grossing tours annually over the last decade, has the stamina to push on.

But when you've built your success on playing live, you tend to stick to a pattern that works.

"We do change the sets and let the music evolve and look for spontaneous moments in what we're doing," Matthews said by phone while sipping a beer at Heathrow Airport, waiting for his flight back home from a week in London. "Maybe I get tired of not being in one place or not having the same pillows every night, but as long as we like playing, it sort of makes all the other [stuff] more bearable."

Over the past few months, the band has been working on fresh material in its new studio in Charlottesville, Va., for a forthcoming album slated for a late 2006 or early 2007 release. It's in this studio -- in a renovated house in their hometown -- that they've been able to really get back to their roots.

"It's our place. There's no pressure," Matthews said. "We can show up at the studio and just sit around and eat and talk and not do a thing. That lack of pressure, in a strange way, creates an environment that is even more creative."

This new album, he said, will have a more aggressive live sound. A few of its guest musicians, including trumpet player Rashawn Ross, will likely join the band on many dates on the tour.