BY FRED SHUSTER >MUSIC WRITER

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With origins in Brentwood and Malibu, the members of smooth pop band Maroon 5 don't even pretend to have the street cred most groups wear like ragged tattoos.

The highly successful five-piece makes no apologies for creating shrewdly crafted Top 40 aimed squarely at the luxury car set. Whether you're willing or not, you've heard their songs on commercials, in your dentist's office and in supermarkets at 2 in the morning.

All of which, naturally, amounts to Maroon 5 being a Grammy Award-winning, multiplatinum group whose latest album, "It Won't Be Soon Before Long," soared straight to No. 1 on the albums chart last spring. Since its debut five years ago, the competent '80s-influenced pop quintet has sold more than 10 million discs, thanks to the radio-friendly hits "Harder to Breathe," "This Love," "She Will Be Loved" and others.

"We didn't set out to invent something new," says Adam Levine, Maroon 5's preening singer, guitarist and main songwriter. "We wanted to be a band where people didn't have to be part of some special secret society to like us. We just want anybody that wants to listen to us to be able to listen to us. We're not exclusive, and we're not a critics' band."

The game plan is working. Maroon 5 - which also includes guitarist James Valentine, bassist Mickey Madden, keyboardist Jesse Carmichael and drummer Matt Flynn - has the sort of mass appeal that defies niche marketing. You can expect to see well-turned-out moms, dads, teens and young adults of both genders in the audience tonight when Levine and company hit the 20,000-seat Staples Center, along with opening acts the Hives and Phantom Planet.

After a Texas concert on the current tour, the Fort Worth Star-Telegram commended Maroon 5 as "a slick, highly entertaining band that seems to put a premium on musicianship and songcraft at a time when so many pop artists simply slap some processed vocals over a canned beat and ride it to stardom. Watching many of the younger attendees devour the scene, you couldn't help but feel glad they were starting out on the right path."

While his fellow four Maroons avoid the spotlight, Levine has no problem living up to the rock-star image. In recent months, he dueted with raunchy hip-hoppers Ying Yang Twins, sang on Kanye West's "Late Registration" chart-topper and appeared on "Saturday Night Live" to sing, along with Andy Samberg, a gay love song to Iran's belligerent president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, played by Fred Armisen.

"I like doing stuff like that - things nobody expects from me," Levine said. "It was funny. It came out better than I thought, and it got a lot more attention than I imagined. People don't think I have a sense of humor for some reason."

At L.A. adult contemporary station Star 98, Maroon 5 is what's called a "core artist," and the station has several of the quintet's songs on its playlist.

"They are one of the most important of this decade so far," said Julie Pilat, Star's music director. "They have huge appeal over all format and demographic lines, they're fantastic musicians, and they write great songs."

Maroon 5 (even the name irritates some critics) essentially began in the basement of Carmichael's family home in Malibu, where, in the early '90s, the keyboardist, Levine and Madden would jam, inspired by the likes of Nirvana and Pearl Jam. After personnel and record company changes, songwriting effort and a good deal of touring as an opening act, the band caught fire, selling a million copies of its 2002 debut, "Songs About Jane," around the time of its 10th anniversary. With the riches came such awards as the Grammy for best new artist of 2005. The band's most recent nomination is in the American Music Awards' pop/rock band category, against Linkin Park and Nickleback, to be announced Nov. 18 on ABC-TV.

No strangers to TV, Maroon 5 was seen last season on "American Idol" in a slot designed to announce the release of "It Won't Be Soon Before Long," the group's second album after five

years, an unusually long time between albums in the here-today, forgotten-in-five-minutes world of the Top 40. Levine says he had only scant knowledge of the inexplicably popular amateur talent contest when they went on the show.

"I knew Sanjaya was this weird kid with the hair who couldn't sing, and that Blake was a fan of our band," Levine, 28, recalls. "The show was such a cultural institution at that point, we thought it was a good idea to perform. Maroon 5 was coming back with a new album - and what better way to tell the country? We were using it that way, and since it's a show about music, we didn't have any problem with it."

Levine doesn't have any problem with girls, either. Linked to many of Hollywood's blondes of the moment, the Maroon 5 frontman set the record straight for Howard Stern over the summer. Contrary to Internet buzz, Levine insisted he'd never been with Paris Hilton, Natalie Portman, Kirsten Dunst or Maria Sharapova. Or Jessica Simpson - while she was still married to Nick Lachey. But he didn't deny hooking up with Lindsay Lohan.

Yet, he says, "My life hasn't become tabloid fodder. You can easily stay away from that, and I hope it continues that way. I don't like to be fussed over, so the paparazzi pretty much leave me alone.

"I learned if you just give them a few good pictures, they'll go away and stalk somebody else."

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Fred Shuster (818) 713-3676; fred.shuster@dailynews.com

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MAROON 5

>Where: Staples Center, 1111 S. Figueroa St., Los Angeles.

>When: 8 pm Thursday, November 8. With the Hives and Phantom Planet.

>Tickets: $20. www.ticketmaster.com.

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Los Angeles' own Maroon 5 broke through nationally in a big way over the last few years. Here are some newer local acts destined to follow in their footsteps.

>OneRepublic: Relocated from Colorado to L.A., this melodic pop band has been surrounded by a huge buzz since the release of the hit single "Apologize," which has a remix featured on Timbaland's "Timbaland Presents Shock Value" album. The band is expected to pack the House of Blues Sunset Strip for its Nov. 20 date. "A great hometown band," says Star 98 music director Julie Pilat.

>Rooney: Named for a character in the film "Ferris Bueller's Day Off," the five-member band draws on '60s and '80s Britpop. They came to attention after landing a cameo on TV's "The O.C." in 2004, and have toured with Fergie, Weezer and the Strokes. A concert taped at the Roxy to mark the new album, "Calling the World," is showing on DirecTV.

>Silversun Pickups: Currently featured as MTV's artist of the week, the oddball pop-rock quartet named for a Silver Lake bottle shop has just issued its debut album, "Carnavas," to enthusiastic response from fans and national radio. The band is now touring overseas with Kaiser Chiefs.

>The Aggrolites: This reggae and ska outfit's current "Reggae Hit L.A." album has drawn acclaim from both sides of the Atlantic. The band draws from early '80s bands like the U.K.'s Madness, English Beat and the Specials but writes its own topical songs. Appears Dec. 29 at the Knitting Factory Hollywood.

>Fred Shuster