The Rocketboys coming to the North Gate

• By MICHAEL FARRAR
• Special to 2theadvocate.com
• Published: Aug 28, 2008 - UPDATED: 8:30 p.m.

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Did you know that college degrees are a major cause of indie bands breaking up? Sad, but true.

Even though all six members of Homer Hiccolm & The Rocketboys have their degrees, they still look at the band as their real jobs.

"We've always wanted to play music full time, even when we were in college. We had been discussing how we wanted to go full time when we graduated." guitarist Daniel Wheeler said.

Homer Hiccolm & The Rocketboys has been getting some cool breaks, and the biggest was winning a battle of the bands, which landed them a spot playing the Austin City Limits Music Festival.

Austin, Texas, has a vibrant music community, so this was not your garden variety competition. Groups had to upload songs on a Web site, then visitors could vote for their favorites bands.

Homer Hiccolm & The Rocketboys made an oddball online video introducing each other as if they are surprised to be meeting up and then break into a cheesy acappella vocal performance and choreographed dance routine encouraging people to vote for them.

Wheeler said the final round of the competition came down to a make-or-break performance in front of a real audience.

"The top five performed a live show in Austin at Antone's, and we managed to win. We entered the contest on a whim and felt like we got pretty luck,” he said.

Winning the contest was totally unexpected, and came as a surprise to band members, but they quickly leanred the benefits of that new level of regional attention.

Sometimes sudden acclaim like that can put pressure on a group that can be hard to overcome but HHRB looks on it as a chance to really ratchet up their efforts and get better as a band.

"It's a mixture of excitement, but also there's a different level of commitment, a different level of seriousness. " Wheeler said. "It just made us realize that we could do this for a living if we really worked hard at it."

Now they have a CD/DVD combo called "Homer Hiccolm & The Rocketboys: Live At Antone's". There's is also the "Sing, Bird, Sing" EP CD, the "South Plains" EP (only available on I Tunes) and another concert performance on the "Colder Nights of Texas: Live In Levelland" DVD/CD.

"We're the type of band that is constantly writing, even though we're touring and performing a lot, we're also writing a lot. So, we always have a pretty big repertoire of songs. And we want to record often enough so that the fans stay engaged." Wheeler said.