Billboard

This might take a little while.

Nickel Creek is pulling out the stops for its 2007 tour because there won't be one next year. Maybe not the following.

The band's three members - Chris Thile, Sean Watkins and Sara Watkins - have spent two-thirds of their lives in Nickel Creek, creating a mutation of pop-smart bluegrass that earned them a still-growing audience. The process was simple and has been in place for years: Record, promote, tour. Repeat.

This time they're icing the repeat. Well, sort of.

Talk to the three, and not one of them suggests some grand plan for a non-musical wind-down. There will be no absorption of Russian literature or learning a new language, designing boats or rescuing dogs from war-torn states, backpacking across Europe or stamp collecting.

Thile (mandolin, vocals) has a bluegrass album he'd like to get around to promoting. There's a project with bassist Edgar Meyer, and touring with that. There's also an ambitious composition about which he's fairly vague.

"I need to try and find a way to get a little less busy," he said. Calling the morning after a recording session that started after midnight, it's difficult to believe him.

Sean (guitar, vocals) says he has a number of "irons in the fire," including a bluegrass EP, and a collaboration with Switchfoot singer (and neighbor) John Foreman. He's also looking forward to "surfing a little more."

Sara (fiddle, vocals) is a little more guarded with her plans. "I have some very specific goals, some people I'd love to work with," she says. "I'd love to have my hand in a few different things."

``I don't think I really want to jump into another huge commitment, but I'd love to be able, in next couple of years, to develop my own abilities so I can be self-reliant on stage musically for an hour hour an a half.''

Thile and Sean have juggled other work with Nickel Creek for years. But Sean explains that amid its successes Nickel Creek became something of a "big machine."

"It needs to go or stop. The people working with us, it's their main thing. It's hard for them to work a few weeks here and a few weeks there."

"And the other side of it is that we'll finally have a big chunk of time to explore these other areas that have been looming the past few years when we tried to do them AND the band. As a musician, you always want to explore new territory."

Just for the record, nothing bad happened. There were no dishes flung, insults or instruments hurled at one another (though only the guitar would REALLY hurt . . .).

The usual combustible suspects aren't here, because this break wasn't a decision made in fiery times.

The band's third album, Why Should the Fire Die?, was bigger, louder and more daring and different than anything Nickel Creek had done. Surely such a creative stretch caused growing pains?

Yeah, not really.

"It's actually in part due to how satisfied we were with Fire that we're doing this," says Thile. "I feel like it was definitely what we were trying to do. Certainly more so than the other two records. That was part of reason we're doing this, none of us could see past that record. We felt like if went into studio again we'd be hard-pressed to come up with something as good."

It should also be noted that this year's tour will wrap a few months before Nickel Creek turns 20.

Thile points out that he and Sara have done this since they were eight. Your average band's members would've hit this point in their 40s.

None of the three expresses any regrets for the early start. "I think maybe more than any other attribute that the band has, that kind of defined us, how early we started," Thile says.

That early start has been well documented.

Three fresh-faced pre-teens in San Diego met at a bluegrass event at a local pizza place in 1989. Each happened to play an acoustic instrument.

Gigs grew into festival appearances. By 1998 bluegrass star Alison Krauss helped secure a record deal with independent Sugar Hill, and produced a self-titled debut.

That album grew as albums once grew. It didn't make a monstrous first-week splash with a six-figure Soundscan tally. It sold in small bunches, then larger bunches, then much larger bunches, topping a half-million sales. Some credit a bluegrass boom prompted by roots music soundtrack O Brother Where Art Thou? That film surely didn't hurt anyone, but some credit should be placed in the direction of Nickel Creek itself. Small wooden instruments took on rock & roll swagger. The group dazzled with its chops, particularly with marathon runs through their song The Fox.

For younger listeners the music sounded organic and real, something different. For some older ones, it might have filled the improvisational void left by the Grateful Dead's demise.

Regardless, a buzz was born.

This Side was released in 2002 and advanced the band's fidgety relationship with bluegrass. It included a whispery take on the traditional English folk ballad House Carpenter and a cover of Spit on a Stranger by alt-rock totems Pavement. It wasn't your grandfather's bluegrass, and fittingly it earned the group a Grammy.

The successes were enviable, but they also create demand for more. More touring, more experimentation.

That led to Why Should the Fire Die? made by a tougher, flintier Nickel Creek.

Now there's the tour. Despite the hints of hiatus, Nickel Creek plans to make this tour its best. The group will be bringing along a number of the friends they've made over the years: superproducer Jon Brion, bassist Meyer, singer-songwriter Glenn Phillips.

The shows already have a feeling of event-ness. Comments about the need to recharge are peppered with enthusiastic chatter about the tour.

Then there will be something of a siesta for Nickel Creek. The members describe it as a proactive decision.

"We're not banging our heads against the wall creatively," says Thile, "but we'd never want it to come to that. This is just maintenance for the band."

Says Sara, "It's really, really time to kind of allow ourselves to go off and do a lot of things we haven't been able to do. And the only way to do it is if everybody's OK with it.
Luckily everybody's OK with it. It's perfect timing for all of us."

Sean sounds confident that there will "be a next time around."
"For the first time, we just don't know when that's going to be."

So this might take a while. The way good things do.

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Band Members - see all 3

• Chris Thile - Mandolin, Vocals

• Sean Watkins - Guitar, Vocals

• Sara Watkins - Fiddle, Vocals