Between losing their record deal and one of their band members, it’s been a tumultuous couple of years for Love and Theft. But all’s well that ends well, and with their brand new deal at RCA Records, the duo  is back on track and feeling better than ever about their future.

“This is the most excited I’ve been in a long time,” Love and Theft member Stephen Barker Liles told Taste of Country during a recent interview. “The fact that we’re over it all now and things are moving forward is a really good feeling.”

Speaking on behalf of his bandmate Eric Gunderson, Liles said, “Eric and I are super stoked about the future. God has blessed us a lot. He has given us faith and kept us encouraged because a lot of people would have given up. We are so grateful to have so many people who believe in us. We’re going to make Sony and RCA proud … I believe that. We’re going to work our tails off for them.”

With Love and Theft’s move from a trio to a duo comes a shift in direction. As Liles put it, “We sound a little different now. With our new producer, we’re able to sound more like what we sound like live. That’s a really important thing. As much as we loved our old record, ‘World Wide Open,’ it didn’t sound like what we sound like live. That’s hard to do sometimes.

“That [album] was fun and everything,” he continued, “but this new stuff is really way more up our alley. It was produced and recorded the way our influences recorded — Johnny Cash, Willie Nelson, Elvis Presley and all those guys. We sang with the band live in the studio. We never got to do that before. The fact that we got to do that was like really fun. We’re hoping everybody receives the new sound pretty well. It’s really a lot more like the Eagles, like we were hoping.”

There’s no word yet on when Love and Theft will be ready to release their RCA debut, but fans can tide themselves over with Liles’ Taylor Swift-inspired solo track ‘Try to Make It Anyway,’ currently available on iTunes.

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