Saturday, Nov. 30, Keith will return to his old hometown. And in at least one respect, Knoxville is more like London than Winston-Salem.

"(England) was an adventure," says Keith. "Shows were good. None of us had ever been over there before. The only thing that was really different was that people knew our songs and were singing along, which was kind of weird. Whereas over here, that happens in Knoxville or in Nashville but not really in other cities.

"For the most part we had rowdy rock 'n' roll shows like we have over here."

Keith isn't exactly a stranger to plane rides and traveling long distances. Since 2000, he's lived in Nashville, Brooklyn and his current hometown of Birmingham, Ala. Then again, the short career of Stateside has itself been a long journey.

A founding member of Knoxville's Viceroys (later changed to V-Roys), Keith left the band in 1996, a few months before the band signed to Steve Earle's E Squared label. Keith relocated to Nashville, where he formed the Nevers with Knoxvillians David Jenkins and Paul Noe. Within a year the Nevers had a major label-deal with Sire Records, though Sire never released the group's album. When the label finally dropped the band from its option in 1999, the Nevers called it quits.

"It was sort of a mutual decision," says Keith. "We had been on Sire for a couple of years by that point, and it was clear they weren't going to put out our record in any reasonable amount of time."

Left with plenty of Nevers songs and no band to play them, Keith formed Stateside with Nashville musicians Adam Landry, Brad Pemberton and Billy Mercer. Stateside's first album, "Twice as Gone," was released in the United States on Disgraceland Records and in Europe on Fargo, an independent label based in France.

During the same time period, Keith, Pemberton and Mercer were also playing in the Pink Hearts, a side project of Ryan Adams. Adams asked the band to go on the road with him. Keith said no.

"I was unwilling to do it because it would take six to eight months away from my life and away from my songs," says Keith.

"And I just wasn't willing to do that. But the other guys were, and that left me without a rhythm section."

Tired of Nashville, Keith relocated to Brooklyn early in 2002 to reform the band. After six months of auditioning musicians, he got a call from friend and guitarist Philip Shouse.

Shouse, calling from Decatur, Ala., was looking for a band, too. Shouse found three other musicians who were interested, and Keith made a trip to Alabama.

"I scraped up enough money to buy a plane ticket and flew down to Decatur," says Keith. "By the first chorus of the first song I knew I wanted to play with these guys. There was immediate chemistry."

The revamped lineup, consisting of Keith, Shouse, bassist Greg Slamen and twin brothers Thomas and Nikolaus Mimikakis on drums and guitar, is for Keith a breath of necessary fresh air.

"I love it," says Keith. "It's more collaborative than before. ... It's a lot bigger sound. It's a lot more guitar intense and it's just, I'm really happy with it."

So what's next for the new and improved Stateside?

"Right now we're going to take a few months off to work and get our affairs in order. We'll be playing in Birmingham and probably some in Knoxville and other cities close by.

"But mostly we're going to keep writing and arranging new songs. Sometime after the holidays we hope to start recording again. We'll be laying low for a while.”