Adam Levine, Maroon 5 Drastically Change Their Sound With New Single ‘It Was Always You’

For Maroon 5’s new album V, front man Adam Levine has drastically changed the band’s typical pop rock sound. With “It Was Always You,” the band steers their musical direction towards a clear 80’s vibe.

Levine all but confirmed this shift in musical direction during a recent interview with MTV News when he described the recording process for V:

“This album is very much all over the place. There’s some stuff on our record that sounds a little like early Maroon 5, and then there’s some stuff that sounds like the newer direction that we went in.”

That newer direction is clearly evident with “It Was Always You” as Maroon 5 introduces synths that harken back to a retro 1980s sound. Adam continued on about Maroon 5’s transformation with V that included retaining some of their trademark anthems while still incorporating something different into the mix:

“It’s our fifth record. [Five] is literally part of our name. We thought we’d get back to certain elements that we’d been missing out on for a while with our original sound, but also bridge the gap with the new stuff that we’ve been doing. I think it’s an all-encompassing kind of record.”

Meanwhile, the story behind the latest Maroon 5 single finds Adam Levine waxing on about a woman he once only saw as as a close friend, but is now his lover:

“Hazel eyes, I was so color blind/ We were just wasting time/ For my whole life we never crossed the line/ Only friends in my mind/ But now I realize/ It was always you.”

There are many, including MTV News, that assume the “Hazel Eyes” in question could be his new bride, model Behati Prinsloo, whom he married during a beach-side ceremony in Mexico earlier this month.

So far, two tracks from Maroon 5’s new album V have been released: “It Was Always You” and “Maps.” And even though the track list for V was recently unveiled — as reported by The Inquisitr — the song many fans are waiting for is the collaboration with fellow Voice coach Gwen Stefani. Adam confirmed the pairing when he called into On Air with Ryan Seacrest in mid-June.

“I wanted it to be a surprise, but she is,” Levine confessed to Seacrest regarding the Gwen Stefani collaboration. He also gushed about Stefani in a recent interview with MTV, calling the time spent with Gwen “incredible” and “so much fun.” Adam continued on about the No Doubt frontwoman:

“We just sat around and talked for hours. It was so fantastic getting to know her. I’m a huge fan of hers.”

You can listen to the new Maroon 5 track “It Was Always You” below.

[Adam Levine/Maroon 5 image courtesy of On Air With Ryan Seacrest ]