Dressed in black from head to toe, with his trademark sunglasses on even after dark on a rainy, stormy New Haven night, Peter Wolf dashed through a side door and into Toad's Place, more than half an hour late, due to weather and traffic tie-ups, for his band's soundcheck for that evening's show.

The legendary singer and performer leaped on the stage, and within minutes, locked into a groove with his band, shaking, dancing and singing, restaking his highly claim as one of rock and roll's best live performers, even to a virtually empty club.

Whether it's playing before 70,000 fans in a stadium setting, 15,000 in an arena, or perhaps hundreds in a small club like Toad's, in a self described "intimate" tour to showcase his powerful new album, "Sleepless," the approach has never changed for Wolf. Clearly, he's there to entertain, but with a deeply felt substance and depth to his music, honed from years of experience in traveling and discovering popular music's by-ways, no matter where they lead.

"To me, it's like being a movie actor, sometimes there's a big movie, and then there's a small movie, but it doesn't make either one any less important," he said in an interview before the show. "Whether it's a 3,000 seat club or a 13,000 seat arena, you still want to have a show that transcends. It takes work, but you can do it."

And, hard work and drive has been synonymous with Wolf's long and varied career.

A 56-year-old New York native who looks 15 to 20 years younger, Wolf displayed that drive at any early age, dropping out of high school to seek out his musical education at clubs and theatres, folkie singalongs, and other haunts in from Manhattan to Chicago to Cambridge. Along the way, he struck up friendships and mined influences from performers as varied as John Lee Hooker, Muddy Waters, Bob Dylan and Van Morrison. In 1967, while at a Boston area coffeehouse, he met the musicians with whom he would reach his pinnacle of popularity, in the blues based, but always rock steady, J. Geils Band. Over a more than two decades career, the Geils Band, with Wolf as its front man and lead singer, forged the unique combination of powerful live performances and strong studio albums that drew favorable comparisons with their English counterparts, the Rolling Stones. In concert, especially, their incendiary drive and spirit was led by the perpetually moving Wolf, who had learned, from his years on the road, to put a premium on an entertaining, yet musically pure show.

"In the Geils Band, we enjoyed the entertainment aspect of it, but we always wanted to give it some content, we were highly influenced by some of the R&B aspects, traditional musical revues, where it was 'one for the money, but two for the show,''' Wolf said. "You know, get out and entertain the audience, really put on a show that rocked. The Stones come from that same kind of place, Springsteen comes from that same kind of place, it's trying to do something other than standing up there and saying 'thank you very much, this next song is…."

That approach in some ways contrasts with the music on "Sleepless," which follows, in a musical progression, Wolf's last album, "Fool's Parade," with another quieter, more intimate approach to the songs, the singing and the arrangements, unlike the more "in your face" style of the Geils Band.

"It comes down to what are you trying to accomplish," he said. "I mean, if you are in the Eagles, your approach to the show is different than if you are in something like the J. Geils Band. It's going to be different if you're doing 'Houseparty,' or if you're doing 'Five O'clock Angel.'

"Yet, I've gone to see some people, George Jones, Billy Joe Shaver, who don't even move (on stage), and they've captivated me. So, it's a complex situation," he added.

In 1999, the Geils Band reformed for a summer tour of sheds and arenas, finishing off the year with a stellar, emotional benefit performance for the families of Worcester, Massachusetts firefighters who had perished in a factory blaze in that city, just a few weeks earlier. The show, which took place at the Orpheum Theatre in their hometown of Boston, was a fitting coda for the tour, which showcased all that was right about that band.

" I thought it was great that we were able to come together, and I also think what was good about it was that we didn't get into any exploitive situations where it was sort of 'let's take the money and run,''' Wolf said about the Geils reunion tour." We tried to do a certain amount of dates, with a reasonable ticket price, to redo the show that our fans had known us for, to put together an evening of the best of J. Geils, and I think we succeeded in that."

Yet, he said, that final show was a very tough night for the band.

"(The Worcester benefit show) was pretty emotional, it was a hard night," he recalled "It was difficult because you're there to help raise money for a terrible tragedy. And, as I think I said that night, we were there to entertain, to try to divorce ourselves from the terrible reason why we were there. It was best to do what we do, and thank everyone for coming out and paying their respects."

Yet, despite the success of that tour, longtime Geils fans shouldn't hold their collective breath for another reunion, Wolf said.

"To do a J. Geils show requires commitment of both body and mind, and I'm not sure if some of the other cast of characters are willing to do it, and I wouldn't want to do it if it wasn't top shelf," he said.

Instead, Wolf continues to concentrate on his solo career, culminating with the release of the stellar "Sleepless," on the relatively small, yet vital, Artemis label. And, Wolf said, working at a small label is a place where he if comfortable, by experience, lending a relaxing atmosphere to one of the strongest recordings of his career.

"I actually started with a small record company run by two brothers (Atlantic's Ahmet and Neshui Ertegun), so it all depends on relationships," he said. "That's really what it comes down to, and I am very grateful that Artemis put out this record, giving me the opportunity to record it, and the freedom to do so."

"(The record) started with (producer) Kenny White and me, in my living room, I'd play some things I wrote, some cover things that I was thinking of doing," he said. "From there, we tried to keep it intimate, and we tried to keep that same kind of vibe in the studio.

"I think that it's much more delicate than I have previously done," Wolf said about the record. "The last album that I did, 'Fool's Parade,' sort of got gobbled up in the corporate environment, with all the companies being bought up, the record never really saw the light of day, and there was sort of a disappointing malaise that carried over into a lot of things. The sad state of affairs definitely had an impact on the songs (on 'Sleepless')."

Wolf, who has been a disk jockey and manager, in addition to being a performer in his career, notes that the record industry is in a deplorable state.

" I think (the recording industry) is in its most unhealthy state," he observed. "The people who started the rock and roll phase of the recording industry had some sort of vision, they were either great lovers and appreciators of music like Ahmet Ertegun, (Motown founder) Berry Gordy, like (Chess Records') Leonard and Marshall Chess, they had an incredible sense for what was important and valid.

"Today, a lot of the controlling aspect of the music industry is being taken over by people whose only concern is not the music, but how much, quote unquote, the product will sell. That's been a tremendous disadvantage," he said." But, we could sit here forever and talk about the problems in the music industry."

Wolf's opinion is the same about radio.

"I wasn't even thinking about radio when I made this record," he said."Commercial radio, for the most part, is basically now just a place for advertising."

Yet, the record, like his live shows, reveals just how much Wolf has learned from the many years on the road, since he left his parents' New York home and began his musical journey.

"I've always taken that somewhat darker path, where things are a bit down and muddy, where you don't get taken into that 'all you need is love' stuff," he said.

"Didn't the guys who sang 'all you need is love' ending up suing each other for about 30 years?"