Alabama Shakes rose to stardom following the release of their debut album "Boys & Girls". Since the set arrived in 2012, the group led by singer Brittany Howard has nabbed several Grammy nominations, graced the stage at the famous Coachella festival a few times and made a name for themselves as rock/alternative act.

They have now found bigger success with their sophomore album "Sound & Color". Released in late April via ATO Records, it was widely praised by music critics and directly landed atop Billboard 200 with 96,000 equivalent units, giving the band their first No. 1 record on the chart.

The newest Alabama Shakes LP is totally not "Boys & Girls" #2. However, the band has said multiple times that their different, new sound wasn't something they planned. "We didn't set out to make a diverse record," guitarist Heath Fogg recently told DIY in an interview for its May issue. "But I do think it ended up that way."

"When we started writing this record, we didn't think about 'Boys & Girls' that much because it happened three years ago. It occasionally hit me that 'this song is not 'Hold On' ', but that was it," Howard added.

In fact, the band didn't even think about what they'd sound like on the album when they first started working on it between the shows on their tour. "I didn't have really have a plan going into 'Sound & Color' but if I heard this record when we started, I would be shocked," Fogg explained.

"It took a couple of different turns that I really like but wouldn't have expected us to do," he continued before Howard added, "I didn't set out to do anything but make ourselves proud."

© AceShowbiz.com