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With the departure of bass player Anthony Kenney from the Kentucky Headhunters scarcely a month ago, the band has come full circle.

It’s been more than 20 years since Doug Phelps joined the band, along with brothers Richard and Fred Young and Greg Martin, a distant relative of the Youngs from the Kentucky hills where the band got its start. After enjoying mainstream country success in the late 1980s and early ’90s, the band went through several lineup changes. Phelps and his brother, singer Ricky Lee, quit the group in 1992. Phelps returned four years later, and until a few weeks ago, the band functioned as a five-piece.

Now, it’s back to the way it started — the Youngs, Martin and Phelps.

“Anthony had a great opportunity in his hometown, and he just felt like it was the right time for him to make this move,” Phelps told The Daily Times this week. “He gave us his notice, and we thought about how we were going to approach this. I’m back on lead guitar and still doing lead vocals, and we’ve come full circle to where we were right before Ricky Lee joined the band.

“We’ve made it all the way back to the beginning. It’s been 15 years since I played bass, but thank goodness it was like riding a bicycle. We’re just having a great time out there, incorporating more of the older songs and the original stuff and trying to balance the old with the new and anything in between.”

The Headhunters have always maintained close ties to family, friends and the roots from which they came. The band can trace its origins back to 1968, when the Youngs joined Kenney and Martin to perform as Itchy Brother. They achieved modest regional success and helped put Southern Kentucky on the map as a place where rock ‘n’ roll could go toe-to-toe with bluegrass. Through the 1970s, the band flirted with national success; a deal with Swan Song, the label founded by rock icons Led Zeppelin, fell through when Zeppelin drummer John Bonham overdosed and died. During that time, the guys moved back and forth from Kentucky to Atlanta, hoping to find a label that would take a chance on them.

In 1982, Itchy Brother broke up; three years later, Martin wanted to reassemble the band. Kenney declined, and Phelps was brought on board. He asked his brother, Ricky Lee, to sing, and the Kentucky Headhunters were born. A seven-song demo album made its way to Nashville, stirring a little interest among country music executives. The band’s rock ‘n’ roll leanings, however, made most labels hesitant to sign them, but in 1989, Mercury took a chance based on the emerging rock ‘n’ roll influence on country acts like Steve Earle and Hank Williams Sr.

The group’s debut, “Pickin’ on Nashville,” went on to win a Grammy and sold well. The group’s second record, “Electric Barnyard,” had similar success, appealing to fans of both country and rock. In 1992, however, the Phelps brothers quit, prompting two original members of Itchy Brother — Kenney and Mark Orr — to come on board.
It was a difficult decision, Phelps said. He and Ricky Lee did OK as the Brothers Phelps, but neither group enjoyed the success they did when the Phelps boys called themselves Headhunters.

“Ricky just got kind of burned out with trying to fight politics and everything that goes on in the music business, and it was really just a difference of opinion on how to proceed at that point,” Phelps said. “We had gone through a lot of fire at that time. In 1995, I got a phone call from Richard that Mark was getting ready to get off the road, and he wanted me to come back on board, so I rejoined, but my brother didn’t.

“Anthony stayed and sang harmonies, and I took over as lead vocals. At that time, though, Ricky came up and we all sat down and talked about the mess we had gone through when Ricky and I split. It gave us time to look back on it and heal some wounds and a lot of misunderstandings that caused things to go in a certain direction that probably wouldn’t have if we’d had a full grasp of what was going on in our minds.”

Until a few weeks ago, the band functioned as a five-piece, averaging a project of new material every couple of years, including 2005’s “Big Boss Man,” which gave the band an opportunity to record some classic material Headhunters-style.

“They approached us about going through the Sony publishing catalogue and picking out 15 tracks that we would redo,” Phelps said. “They were looking for us to go more along the lines of their Acuff-Rose catalogue, the country catalogue, but they told us to go through and pick out whatever we wanted. Initially, I think, they were looking for new versions of classic songs that they could pitch for commercials, TV shows or whatever might come up.”

The band selected material by Jimmy Reed, Patsy Cline, The Beatles, Bob Dylan and Hank Williams Sr. A Roger Miller song, “Chug-a-Lug,” became so popular on the dance floors of country music clubs like Electric Cowboy and Cotton Eyed Joe’s that the band re-recorded their own version of it to make it longer and more dance-friendly.

Saturday, the band will headline the concert at Smoky Mountain Harley-Davidson in Maryville, part of this weekend’s H.O.G. Rally activities. The guys are still riding high on last year’s release, “Flying Under the Radar.” It’s an apropos title, Phelps said, perhaps even more so now that the band is back to its 1986 lineup and finding avenues outside of mainstream country radio, which has long since passed the Headhunters by for newer, slicker acts.

“That’s the perfect title, because we’re finding other ways to get some exposure for our music,” Phelps said. “People still know our name, and they still come out to see us and have a great time, which is why we’re still here today. Somehow or other, we’ve made an impact, and luckily, we’ve had some hardcore fans over the years. We know we’re very fortunate and blessed.”