Lady Antebellum to 'Step Away' From the Spotlight 'For a Little While'

Charles Kelley, who's expecting his first child, says the band is ready to take a break.

Lady Antebellum has been a country radio constant for more than half a decade -- now they're ready to take a break.

As the band wraps up the promotional tour for their latest album, 747, Charles Kelley says Lady A will be stepping away from the spotlight and re-shifting their focus.


WATCH: Lady A and Zedd Team Up for Epic Cross-Genre Performance

"As a band, we've talked about wanting to get off the hamster wheel for a little bit and let the fans miss us for a second," he told Rolling Stone Country. "We want to spend some time to write a record like we did for our first record. But it's always been go, go, go, so we'll try to get re-inspired a little bit."

Lady A's self-titled debut hit shelves in 2008, featuring the tracks "Love Don't Live Here," "I Run to You" and "Lookin' for a Good Time." Since their wildly successful sophomore album, Need You Now, was released in 2010, the band has put out a brand new record (and several more hit singles) every year.

"We can take some time off and not feel like we're going to lose it all. We felt like that in the past, if we left off the throttle. So, yeah, we're not quite as hot as we were around 'Need You Now,' but we realize the fans are there," Kelley continued. "It's all about the music, so we need to step away and make the best music we can. That's the only way it's going to sustain itself."

Ironically, Kelley added: "We're probably the happiest as a band we've ever been."


NEWS: Charles Kelley Is Going to Be a Dad!

Kelley and his wife Cassie recently announced that they are expecting their first child, a boy, after years of struggling with fertility.

"This journey to become a family of three has been a long, interesting, sometimes fun and sometimes heartbreaking road," Cassie wrote in a blog post on Womanista, revealing that the couple was told that they had a one percent chance of conceiving naturally.

"I woke up one morning in June and there it was, a positive pregnancy test," she wrote. "I was in shock. Happy shock, but shock. Our baby decided to join our family in God’s time, which is always right."

As the Kelley family prepares for baby, the singer/songwriter also plans on penning a few new tracks for other artists. Kelley recently celebrated a No. 1 single with Darius Rucker's "Homegrown Honey" and Lady A contributed to one of Hunter Hayes' latest, "Where It All Begins."


WATCH: Lady A Talks ‘747’ Album Process

"Just being able to write a song that may not necessarily be a Lady Antebellum song, to put on a different hat. I love writing with other artists, I really do," Kelley said. "Because you can try to guess what they would want to say, and how they would sing it."

On their way to the ACM Awards this year, Lady A suffered a terrifying setback when their tour bus caught on fire. ET was with them just after the incident, with Hillary Scott still visibly shaken -- but her faith stronger than ever. See the interview in the video below.