I was on the web and came across this article. It’s very interesting.
The Jonas Brothers are so hot right now that virtually anything connected to them is hot by association.
Take, for example, the pop band Honor Society, who are based in the Jonas Brothers’ home state of New Jersey.
Their entire musical output has been an independent EP, “A Tale of Risky Business,” released last spring, and they don’t even have a record label yet.
But announced in mid-March as the opening act on the Jonases’ North American tour this summer, Honor Society suddenly has almost 2.8 million visits to its MySpace page, where one of its songs, “See U in the Dark,” has more than a million plays. They’ll also to be in the movie “Alvin and The Chipmunks 2,” set for Christmas release.
And some magazines are even calling them “the next Jonas Brothers.”
Anyone too curious to wait for the tour, which kicks of June 20 [they play Philadelphia’s Wachovia Arena July 23 and 24], can see Honor Society on Saturday as the opening weekend attraction at HersheyPark amphitheater, then May 3 at the huge Bamboozle Festival at Meadowlands Sports Complex in East Rutherford, N.J.
Asked in a recent telephone call the obvious question — how much the Jonas connection has meant to their meteoric popularity — singer/guitarist Michael Bruno gives the obvious answer.
“I mean, a tremendous amount,” Bruno says while driving to the band’s Los Angeles apartment after morning meetings with more entertainment executives. “It would be silly to think anything otherwise.
“They have such a platform and they’ve been so generous with us, so obviously we’ve seen our popularity grow many times over. And this summer, being on tour with them, we’re obviously going to be exposed to as many people as we could even dream about. We’re just hoping to make a real impression to all those people.”
Why the band was anointed by the Jonases isn’t all that cryptic, Bruno says.
Bruno and keyboardist Jason Rosen grew up in Rockland County, N.Y., and, with bassist Andrew Lee, for a couple of years tooled around New York clubs, including under the name Airborne. (Bruno says an Australian band also called Airborne “asked us politely to step down from that name”).
Then, a year and a half ago, they filled a “revolving door” at the drummer’s position with another Rockland County native, Alex Noyes.
Noyes’s previous gig was drummer for the Jonas Brothers
The band renamed themselves Honor Society and recorded the EP, which found its way into the hands of Nick, Joe and Kevin, Bruno says.
“They liked what they heard and we started to sort of just get to know each other, set up some meetings,” he says. Last summer, the Jonases invited Honor Society to their concerts, “and we kind of just got to hang. And that really was the beginning of the relationship.”
Honor Society began opening Jonas shows, “and where it stands now, they’re honestly some of our best friends and we just have an awesome time making music together and it’s just a real blessing of a situation,” he says.
They’ve now signed with Jonas Group Management and are recording a full-length disc that likely will include at least two songs they wrote with the Jonas Brothers. But asked about Internet rumors they’ll sign with to a label the Jonases will start, Bruno demurs, saying the band’s focus right now is “just making music.”
“That would be great,” he says. “We’re not privy to all the business things that they’re doing, but we’d be more than happy.” He said they are working on “a production deal-thing right now with them, so they are involved in our album, so we’ll see.”
The band describes its music as what it might sound like “if Justin Timberlake had a rock band.”
“What that means, really, is we’re four guys who grew up playing rock-band instruments, meaning guitar and keyboards and drums, so that influence is inherently there,” Bruno says. But their musical tastes lean more toward R&B and folk music, “all the way back to Stevie Wonder and all the way up to people like Kanye West and The-Dream and Usher and Justin,” he says.
Honor Society fan boards have taken to calling the band “The Gentlemen” because of their trademark look — members dress as if, well, they’re in an honor society, with preppy ties and jackets. That also came naturally, Bruno says.
“We’re basically four guys from the suburbs, so the style was kind of there,” he says. “But I think at some point … we wanted to take it to the next level, go from maybe just wearing a collared shirt to a collared shirt with a tie, then a collared shirt with a bow tie. But it was nothing calculated. It was nothing that a stylist put together for us.”
As for being the next Jonas Brothers, Bruno notes the differences, including age: while Noyes is 22, Honor Society’s other members are 29 and 30, “so I think our fan base might be a little bit different as time goes on,” he says.
But because of their connection to the Jonases, Honor Society understands the comparisons and “it feels great, and obviously it makes us want to just constantly bring our A-game,” Bruno says.
“I don’t think there’ll be a next Jonas Brothers,” he says. “They are who they are and they’ve really just been white-hot. They’ve just been conquering and just they’re doing amazing stuff. So our thing is just to focus on being the best Honor Society that we can be.”
