In the eyes of Tracy Lawrence, "Strong," his disc out in late March on DreamWorks, represents not only a debut for a hot label, but also a bid to resurrect his career.

That from a man who started his career blazing with hit single after hit single only to endure domestic and legal problems, a suspension in effect from his long-time label and an album 2 1/2 years ago that despite lots of good music, failed to light a spark either at radio or with consumers.

The Texas native is back with a mix that stays country while going for a bit more of a contemporary sound.

"I think my goal for this record was to try to expand my boundaries and reinvent myself to a degree," says Lawrence via cell phone somewhere en route between Hartford and Boston during a radio promotion tour. "This has been a real important time for me with the format. I'm not a format chaser. I never have been. To be commercially viable again, I had to see what was going with the format. This is a business - to be able to sell product and get airplay on the radio. You know, I had a lot of success in the '90s. That was then. I wanted to make something that was a little more edgier and more contemporary with what was going on in the marketplace."

"I took it more as a challenge to try to do things that I hadn't attempted to do before. What made it easier for me was actually having a producer that I have as 1,000 percent confidence in. I couldn't have done this album if I had done it myself. This was the time for me to give the producer the ball to leave it (with him) to record a contemporary album."

Said producer was James Stroud, not only the main cheese at DreamWorks, but also the fellow who produced Lawrence's first album for Atlantic, "Sticks and Stones," way back in 1991.

When Lawrence started cutting the album in about August 2002, DreamWorks was not in the picture. "This actually was an album that was actually recorded for Warner Brothers," says Lawrence.

(Lawrence's longstanding label, Atlantic, folded its Nashville division, which was taken over by sister company Warner).

But Lawrence does not sound exactly sad that he switched labels given his experience with "Tracy Lawrence" in 2001.

"That was pretty frustrating too because I thought it was a good album," says Lawrence of the self-titled album. "I thought there were some (hits) on that. It was disheartening because I think the label walked on that album. I tried to cut a really traditional record. It was a situation where I had to try to reinvent myself because I wasn't getting any more (attention). They didn't like my music. They didn't like the direction I was going. I was trying to create some excitement in the album."

"It's pretty disheartening when you spend a few months in the studio, and you put your artistic heart and soul in the music, and the label says 'nah, we don't think there's anything there we could use'. It makes you feel like a stepchild. Especially when you're shifted over from a label that just closed. "

"You step back and go, 'okay what am I doing wrong here?'" Lawrence says.

"I really feel I'm in a much better place," he says. "I want to be positive and look toward the future and focus where it is on here going in the next five years of my life. It's much more constructive than focus on what didn't happen at Warner."

Under his agreement with DreamWorks, Stroud was limited to producing one non-label act.

"We sat down and had a lengthy conversation," says Lawrence. "He really has a lot of confidence in me as an artist. When I got cut from Warner, James came in, and we went in and cut a couple of more sides."

As far as Stroud was concerned, he had himself a new artist for his label."It led me to getting a new start on a new label," says Lawrence. "It all kind of fell in line strange as it was."

Lawrence says he did consider other producers before going with Stroud, meeting with Buddy Cannon, Billy Joe Walker Jr. and Byron Gallimore. "I was actively searching for the right producer," says Lawrence. "When James and I sat down, we knew it was time for me to work (together) again...I had one more album (due to Warner). I was looking down the road. I had a really the desire to go to DreamWorks anyway. When I got released (from Warner), it happened sooner than I expected. But it was where I wanted to end up anyway. I really believe if it was not Stroud to produce this record, I probably would not have had a record label."

Lawrence says he did not really consider other labels because of the foundation already laid with Stroud. "There was so much stuff in the works that there didn't seem to be any reason to look anywhere else," he says.

RCA was a possibility, according to Lawrence, "but they already have a lot of hat acts over there. I want my own identity. I'm not overlapping with anybody at the (DreamWorks) label. I kind of have my own slot. It let me come into a situation where I was able to be myself. When they're releasing their albums and what kind of product they have, it's not like anything else they have. I think that's important from my perspective."

Having a new label is not the only thing different for Lawrence who lives on a farm outside of Nashville in Mt. Juliet with his wife and two young girls.

This marked the first album he has not written one song.

"I tried to write, I just had a writer's block this time. My wife and I have started a family. We moved, and there was a lot of stuff going on. I guess I had too much going on in my life. I sat down with my writing partners, and I couldn't do it. I said I'm not going to force something that's not coming right now. I'm going to stop and back up and go back to the streets of Nashville and go to writers and see what they've got and just look at it through different eyes. I don't regret that. I'll do a lot more next time. My head wasn't in it."

Asked whether the writer's block period was difficult, Lawrence says, "It was. It was quite frustrating. I'd never experienced that before. I think it fell on the concept of me reinventing myself to a degree and not knowing how I should write this record for...I think this gave me an idea of where I need to go with my writing."

Not that Lawrence is complaining because he seems quite satisfied with the dozen songs found on "Strong."

The title track is also the first single. "The response from radio and everybody out there has been real good," he says, adding, "We got a lot of airplay around the country."

"Strong" is the type of song Martina McBride might sing from the lyrical standpoint. In other words, it's about a strong, single woman who forges her own trail.

"It's different than anything I've done in the past. This is the single woman's anthem. Divorced. Having a hard time with the dating scene. I thought it was such a great anthem for the working moms."

Lawrence, 36,describes "Stones" as "one of the more traditional things on the record."

And it came close to being the title of the album. But there was a bit of a marketing problem because Lawrence's first album was 1991's "Sticks and Stones," a big hit for him.

"These are the kind of songs that I have the most passion about recording," Lawrence says. "They have a good message in them. As a vocalist, I sink my teeth into the songs. I think I like the hard-core traditional aspect of it. That's where my roots come from. The Haggard story songs are where my foundation and appreciation for country music come from."

Lawrence was born in Atlanta, Texas and moved to Foreman, Ark. when he was about four.

"It's your typical small, extremely small, town, country life," he says."There wasn't even a red light. There were 1,200 people, a little tiny school. I went to the same school with the kids from kindergarten to 12th grade. Pretty much the same people my entire life. It allowed you a little bit more freedom to express yourself without getting in trouble."

"We didn't do anything bad, but we did (live) pretty hard. We started drinking too early. There wasn't much to do there. There was one cop in town, and you pretty much knew when he went to bed because he parked his car at the police station."

"I didn't like to go home," says Lawrence of his growing up years. "That was my problem from the time I was a young teenager on. I had my buddies. I hung with older guys. There was a lot of friction there (with my parents)."

Lawrence's mother had remarried a man who was a banker.

"I turned onto George Strait and Merle Haggard when I was about 12. That's when I started getting into my head that's what I wanted to do. There was nobody in my family that really played an instrument. I found that outside."

"When I was 14, I did a talent show in the county seat which was Ashtown, and I played my guitar and I played a Merle Haggard song ("Big City") and a song I wrote. There was a deputy sheriff named Gary. There were a lot of things around the area, which we called jamborees. A lot of times it was an old movie theatre that had been gutted out."

Various groups would play for the first hour with a house band closing the evening an hour plus set.

"Gary heard me on this talent show and took me under his wing," Lawrence says. "I became a regular on all of these things."

Lawrence wrote a lot of poetry during his high school years. "I really loved literature. I loved to write. I was very literary. I didn't do well in grammar. I understand Socrates and Shakespeare. It had a grasp for me."

Lawrence spent a few years at Southern Arkansas College on a music scholarship. While singing with the choir, Lawrence also continued playing with a band called Crosscreek, which he joined when he was about 16 or 17. They hit the honky tonks, VFWs, "all the rough dives and stuff."

"I knew I wanted to get into the music business. I didn't know exactly how to do it because I didn't know anybody. I started doing radio and TV production. That seemed to me the most logical way to go, but I didn't really enjoy it."

And so he left college for the Texarkana area where he was from. He worked at a paper mill and joined a band in Louisiana, signaling the end of his mill days.

"This band became one of the top three bands in the area, and we were working a lot," he says of the group that had a southern rock sound. I was playing in bigger clubs for more people. I was learning how to work a crowd for four or five or five sets."

Perhaps the pivotal moment in Lawrence's career came in the fall of 1990 when he was in Ruston, La., working for a landscaping company and considering his future.

He was two weeks away from starting classes at Louisiana Tech. "I woke up in the middle of the night. I said if I do this, I'm stuck here."

"I cancelled all the club gigs," he says. "I finished my last weekend (band) obligation. I packed my car, and I left the next week, and I'm glad I did. Awfully glad I did."

Next stop...Nashville.

Lawrence hit open mic nights. "I was getting up anywhere where I could sing. I was meeting all the musicians I could meet and the songwriters I could meet. That's why I had crazy jobs. I didn't want to get a 40-hour-a-week job that would tie me down."

His great success at talent shows subsidized his living expenses.

One such win enabled him to be on a radio show, "Live at Libbys," which was broadcast for several hours on a Saturday night.

`"I wound up becoming a regular on that show, and actually a record exec from Atlantic came up to watch another person. They really liked me. I did a showcase for everybody in January at the Bluebird (Café in Nashville) and by May of '91, I was recording 'Sticks and Stones.'"

"I was so focused. Everything was about the music to me. I really felt it was my destiny. I really felt it was what I was supposed to be doing. From the time I was 12, I knew what I wanted. I didn't know how I was going to get there. I was just searching for the path."

"Whether it was taking seven months or seven years, I was destined to do this," he says.

"James Stroud came that night too. James decided he was going to produce my album before I signed."

But disaster struck before the album came out. He was returning a female friend to a hotel in Nashville following a concert and on May 31, 1991, Lawrence was shot four times in a Shoney's parking lot.

The album was put on hold, and he required a lot of rehabilitation. In fact, he underwent his third knee surgery in December resulting from the shooting, which still affects him.

"I can't do any impact (events)," he says. "I'll never be able to run again. I have serious arthritis in my left knee."

At the time, Lawrence says he tried forging ahead. "I was just ready to get back on track and get past it. I was lucky to be alive. I was glad to be alive. I was concerned about it being a lack of interest from the record label. Here if I was laid up for six months, someone else would take my slot. I just put blinders on and worked as hard as I could."

The hard work paid off in bushels.

His very first single, "Sticks and Stones," hit number 1 in November 1991. Three more singles from the album - "Today's Lonely Fool," "Runnin' Behind" and "Somebody Paints the Wall" - went top 10.

"The reality of it is it is a very humbling experience," he says. "From having nothing to hearing yourself on the radio is overwhelming to me. The reality of it hit home. I never experienced anything like this in my life. Years and years of dreams were coming true."

The dreams continued in the spring of 1993 when his second album, "Alibi," was released. The title track went number one. So did "Can't Break It to My Heart," My Second Home" and "The Good Die Young."

But during this period, he had a brush with the law on April 4, 1994. While driving with his brother in a pick-up truck, Lawrence claimed youths shot at the vehicle, and he, in turn, shot into the air. Lawrence was charged with two counts of aggravated assault" for firing the gun into the area and carrying a prohibited weapon because he had no permit. He was put on probation, and charges were later dropped.

The charges didn't seem to slow down his career as he continued wracking up hits like "Texas Tornado," "Time Marches On" and "Better Man, Better Off."

But the legal problems didn't abate. The most serious was that Lawrence was accused of domestic abuse against his first wife, which he denied. But he was convicted in 1998.

With his career in jeopardy, Atlantic put Lawrence on probation until he got his life together. "Lessons Learned" came out in 2000, ending his pariah status. The title track did well, but between this album and a self-titled effort on Warner in 2001, Lawrence's career was in a downward spin. Only one of seven singles was a hit.

Lawrence does not fault Atlantic for the suspension.

"I know there was a little bit of frustration from my part. I probably needed to be put on hold for a little while. I was getting too big for my britches. It was time for me to reassess and make some changes in my life. There was a lot of things in my life that I was doing to myself and other people. I was very spoiled. Very arrogant. I was doing a lot of things to excess."

"It was time for me to change," he says. "I think it's helped me get to a better place now."

Lawrence thinks many of his problems resulted form the shooting incident. "I really believe, and I can't stress it enough, and I think I never addressed that issue. I think suppressed a whole lot, and I had carried a weapon. I think I never coped with that incident. I was never able to get all that aggression out. It made me get my hostilities out. I made some bad decisions."

"It then just kind of snowballed and one stupid act led to another. Next thing you know, I damaged my career and my livelihood."

"I started drinking heavy (before and after his divorce)," he says.

"When I met the woman who's my wife now, she loved all of me. She believed in me. She took all that anger and got it out of me and made me whole again. I don't know (how). I'm glad she did."

Career-wise, Lawrence says he thinks "there have been quite a few lingering effects from it. That's part of the struggle that we're having. It's part of the stuff that we have to overcome. It takes me staying on the path from now on. There are no more second chances for me realistically."

Lawrence appears at peace with his life and career at the moment.

As for concerns about how "Strong" will do, Lawrence says, "I really don't because I've gotten to a point where I'm so content with myself in my life."

"Any success I have it's going to be appreciated. I'm not a little kid, that little kid who had a hit in '91. I believe this ride is going to happen again."