Songwriting was the easiest, most natural way Lifehouse vocalist Jason Wade made sense of his nomadic, often lonely teenage life.

Wade's childhood was a time line of six-month chapters spent in countless Asian cities. A half-year in Honolulu when Wade was 8 preceded years of near-constant family relocations.

Upon finally moving the family back to the states, his parents split up. Wade was 16, and again faced with bouncing from home to home.

"Moving around a lot, I never had any close friends," said Wade. And here was another "really difficult time period where I didn't feel I had any roots ... (and) no place to call home."

Wade began writing furiously, channeling his pain into poetry and lyrics. He was already teaching himself guitar, so he also worked on matching his words with melodies.

"Music became almost therapeutic. And writing songs was almost like writing in my diary," said Wade. "It was almost like medicine to try to help me figure out what I was going through."

A lot of what Wade was going through at the time would make it onto Lifehouse's debut CD, "No Name Face." A mega-hit alt-rock ballad you may remember hearing, oh, say a million times in 2001, called "Hanging by a Moment," made the CD a 3-million-plus-selling smash.

One underwhelming sophomore CD later, Lifehouse is back from potential one-hit-wonderland with another huge radio hit ("You and Me") and yet another on-its-way-to-a-million-in-sales CD journal of Wade's life ("Lifehouse").

And Wade returns to his former short-term home for Lifehouse's first-ever Honolulu show Saturday at Kapono's.

DEBUT AND A DOWNER

Thoughtful and well-mannered, the 25-year-old Wade is also one of the most frankly honest rock stars you'd ever want to meet. Asked a question about the music he grew up with, he didn't hesitate offering more.

"My mom and sister were singers, but we never really had that much music around the house," said Wade. "When my dad left and kind of went and did his own thing with his life, my mom was so poor that we had to use the government to even pay for food. So CDs weren't a luxury that we could afford."

Lifehouse formed and began touring the West Coast club scene when Wade was 17. Drawn to Wade's earnest lyricism, brooding tenor and the band's clean post-grunge rock sound, DreamWorks signed Lifehouse two years later. "No Name Face" was released in the fall of 2000, with "Hanging by a Moment" as its first single.

Within six months, "Hanging" was a multiformat radio smash, peaking at or near the top of Billboard's modern rock, mainstream Top 40, adult Top 40 and Hot 100 singles charts. Billboard ranked it the most-played radio track of 2001.

"I didn't grow up listening to radio, so I didn't know that there were ... (various formats)," said Wade, laughing. "But I think that was a good thing, because I didn't go into (the studio) ... trying to cater to radio.

"I just wrote songs from a pure, honest place, and all of a sudden, it just hit at the right time."

Working to avoid a sophomore slump, Lifehouse wound up with the very thing it dreaded with its 2002 follow-up CD "Stanley Climbfall." The over-thought, often meandering "Stanley" sold fewer than 500,000 copies, and its tracks were mostly ignored by radio.

"We we trying not to think about it at the time, but we couldn't help let the label and everyone just kind of come in and look over our shoulder and tell us what kind of record to make," said Wade. "We definitely tried to cater towards radio ... to make more of a rock record than, probably, we felt comfortable with."

The CD's lower-than-expected sales stung. Founding bassist Sergio Andrade and guitarist Sean Woolstenhulme soon departed, leaving just Wade and drummer Rick Woolstenhulme (Sean's brother) to pick up the pieces.

Wade vowed he'd never compromise his songwriting again.

BACK TO BASICS

Lifehouse kicked off recording sessions for its self-titled third CD last year with a new label (Geffen, which bought out DreamWorks), a new producer (John Alagia, known for his work with the Dave Matthews Band, John Mayer and Jason Mraz) and a new bassist (Bryce Soderberg).

Alagia wanted the band out of pressure-filled L.A. and shacked up at his very country eastern Maryland home studio. Lifehouse quickly accepted the invitation.

Under Alagia's "mellow and nonassuming" tutelage, the band recorded more than 50 songs Wade had composed over two years. Having felt pushed in the past by DreamWorks to produce a harder rock sound, Wade reveled in time spent making sure "Lifehouse" was closer to the band's acoustic-driven heart.

Paring "Lifehouse" down to a dozen tracks, Wade didn't peg the soulful love song "You and Me" as an obvious first single.

"The record label, though, were very sure of themselves. And I guess they were right, you know?" said Wade, laughing.

Yeah, we know.

"You and Me" has spent nine week at No. 1 on Billboard's Adult Top 40 chart, and was certified gold for downloaded sales of 100,000 two months after its February release. The "Lifehouse" CD recently notched sales of 500,000, peaking on Billboard's album chart at No. 10.

A DVD of videos and live concert footage titled "Everything" will be out Nov. 22.

Having once again returned to channeling the everyday pains and pleasures of his life into his band's music, Wade is happy to see the life back in Lifehouse.

"Anything I go through, I'm going to write about. ... (And) I just wrote about what was happening at the time," he said of the songs on "Lifehouse." "It was just another difficult time period that turned out to be a very positive thing in the end."

Reach Derek Paiva at dpaiva@honoluluadvertiser.com.