When Brooks & Dunn dropped “Brand New Man,” they were just looking for a hit – and not thinking about realigning the potential for modern country music. But with their bulked-up sound, their full-tilt attack and their way with a hook and a melody, 21 #1 singles and 27 million records later, it’s safe to say their revved up honky tonk sound has redefined country.

“We were singing about girls that got away…good times…hard times…having fun…aching…,” says Kix Brooks, the whirling dervish songwriter known for his high-timing stage persona. “We were singing about things we knew, things we learned playing beer joints and honky tonks. And it seems like a lot of other people were living that stuff, too.”

“Neon Moon” led to “Boot Scootin’ Boogie” led to “Hard Workin’ Man,” “That Ain’t No Way To Go,” “Rock My World (Little Country Girl)” led to “She’s Not The Cheatin’ Kind,” “My Maria,” “Mama Don’t Get Dressed Up For Nothing,” and…and…and…a string of hits in this millennium that’s second to none: “Only In America,” “Ain’t Nothing ‘Bout You,” “You Can’t Take The Honky Tonk Out Of The Girl,” “The Long Goodbye” and “Red Dirt Road.”

With a track record like the 4-time Entertainers of the Year, they may be more dependable than Timex, but way more exciting. And so it is that while nobody was really keeping score, it’s already time for Brooks & Dunn’s The Greatest Hits Collection II.

“We’re not keeping score…We’re not hung up on the milestones,” says Ronnie Dunn, the man whose vocal chords are so muscular he can wring every atom of nuance from a song without ever seeming to push. “We keep trying to top ourselves, to make it better. We want to dig deeper into the music, find songs that feel right – and keep reaching. It’s what’s brought us this far, and it’s the thing that’s going to keep driving us as writers and as performers.”

The award-winning, multi-platinum duo debuted “That’s What It’s All About,” lead single from The Greatest Hits Collection II, at the 2004 Academy of Country Music Awards. This sweeping song about the things in life that really matter, in the end, reads like the realization of the character in “Red Dirt Road” – after going home to get the girl after figuring out that the big ole world wasn’t nearly as precious as she was.

“It’s simple things, really,” says Dunn. “The more you learn, the more you figure out…the more you realize the lessons you learned growing up, the things you feel – that is what really matters. It’s easy to miss that, chasing after a career or whatever – and you do have to work hard in this world, there’s no way around it – but when that gets out of balance with your family, with your friends, with the things that matter…well, that’s what this song is about.”

Given that Brooks & Dunn have played the Presidential Inauguration, the Winter Olympics and the Dale Earnhardt Tribute Concert…have staged three Neon Circus & Wild West Shows – featuring a sideshow of jugglers, clowns, trick ropers, mechanical bulls, the Honky Tonk Hall of Fame along with some of the brightest rising stars in country music ranging from Toby Keith and Keith Urban to Montgomery Gentry and Rascal Flatts…quietly raise all kinds of money for myriad charities…and even graced the Corn Flakes box, this is a duo that knows how to get things done. They’re not afraid to dig in, to work hard, to keep striving.

And along the way, they’ve always started at the same place: with the music.

“When we went in to make the last record,” Dunn explains, “we wanted to really strip things back, to really get into where we came from musically – because we both have pretty broad backgrounds. We both grew up with some pretty intense church music…then Kix was playing all over Louisiana before coming to Nashville to write songs, and I left Bible college to go to Tulsa where the Mad Dogs & Englishmen folks were, plus Johnny Wills was playing swing music and there were ALL kinds of honky tonks.

“Kix and I got exposed to a lot of different kinds of music…and the more we do this, the more we try to bring all that stuff to what we’re doing. But it’s also about bringing the music down to what’s essential…It lets the music hit just as hard, I think.”

Certainly the breathtaking ballad, “It’s Getting Better All The Time,” which measures the slow receding of a powerful heartache with a detail-driven honesty, puts the listener right in the beat of a broken heart. As lean as anything the hard-charging pair has ever recorded, it’s a tour de force vocal performance from Dunn, where the emotion is strung like wire across the sky – and the fragility of healing flows like electricity through the performance.

The Village Voice hailed Dunn’s gifts as a singer, proclaiming, “Ronnie Dunn intentionally sounds like the missing link between Ray Charles and Hank Williams,” and Rolling Stone opined, “Nobody in Nashville has a truer, fuller tenor than Dunn.”