Kiefer Sutherland acting like a musician these days

After saving the world, what does heroic anti-terrorist Jack Bauer of "24" fame do for an encore?

He records an album and hits the road for a U.S. tour.

Actually, it's not the fictional action hero who will perform Thursday at a sold-out Sellersville Theatre show, but the actor who played him on the smash Fox series. And Kiefer Sutherland understands there may be some skepticism concerning his (temporary) career change.

"I am completely aware of the stigma attached to an actor doing music," Sutherland, 49, said during a recent conference call with reporters. "And I know they aren't going to be for everybody. And I'm fine with that.

"I've always likened our show to that of a NASCAR race. I think people are coming out to see a crash. And it's our job to try and show them a really good race. And so far, that's been going really well. I'm just glad they show up. I don't care why anyone comes to see the show, if they're coming for a laugh or not. It's our job as a band to give them a great show and try to make it a night they'll remember for a while," he added, referring to guitarists Austin Vallejo and Michael Gurley, bassist Joseph De La O, and drummer Jess Calcaterra, members of Sutherland's eponymous band.

Sutherland, who counts Johnny Cash, Kris Kristofferson, and Merle Haggard among his influences ("They wrote about a darker side of life"), is hardly a trailblazer: During the last few decades, you haven't been able to swing a Fender Telecaster without hitting a musical movie star. Kevin Bacon, Russell Crowe, Bruce Willis, and Kevin Costner are just some of the bold-face names who have jumped off the silver screen and onto a stage. But he can hardly be called a dilettante, having taken violin lessons between the ages of 4 and 10, and then switching to guitar.

Nonetheless, music as a serious pursuit is of a much more recent vintage.

Although no stranger to composing songs, "I had no intention to make an album," he said. "I'd been writing songs for the last 10 years, which was kind of a nice, private byproduct" of being a co-founder, with his best friend, singer-songwriter-producer Jude Cole, of the Ironworks record label. "They were very private. They were songs I was writing for myself. And I found that to be really cathartic."

But fate obviously wasn't content with that state of affairs.

"I took them about a year and a half ago to record them in the hopes I could send them to BMI or Sony Music and ultimately get another artist to record them," he said. "When we finished the first two songs, Jude said he really, really liked them a lot. He said he thought I should keep them, I should do the rest of the songs that I had and potentially make an album.

"I remember laughing and said, 'That's ridiculous.' Later that night, we had a couple drinks and it sounded like a better idea. So we agreed to do two more. I started to like the way they sounded, and the way they flowed together, and at that point, I had to make the choice to do the record."

And once the CD, the country-rocking Down in a Hole (due out this summer on the Ironworks label) was completed, the next logical step was to hit the road. So far, Sutherland, who returns to TV in the fall as president of the United States in the new ABC-TV drama Designated Survivor, seems to be thriving as a troubadour thanks, he noted, in large part to the personal connections he makes with the audience.

"It's a huge 'ask' to ask an audience to listen to 12 songs they never heard," he reasoned. "So I try to explain where I was when I wrote the song, why I wrote it, and what was happening in my life at the time" a song was composed.

"When I've been playing the shows, I think people start to realize that my life is not that different from theirs.

"Yes, I've had some extraordinarily positive things happen in my life; I've been able to do some things that I think a lot of people would have loved the opportunity to do. But the human experience is very common between myself and an audience, and that, I think has been nice for me to express and it's been interesting for people to hear."

Kiefer Sutherland, 8 p.m. Thursday, Sellersville Theater, 24 Temple St., Sellersville. Sold out. 215-257-5808, st94.com.