"I met some guys in a record store and we started a 'just for fun' band," guitarist and lead singer Eric Epps explains. "You know: drinking and playing fast. We were mostly into the drinking."

It was fun, but they broke up because they couldn't agree which was more important: the drinking or the playing. Before long, though, their old fans were begging them to get back together (for the music, not the drinking). The Athletes thought: Maybe this could work. It has.

"Everything we've done, we've done on our own. We don't have a manager, a booking agent, nothing. And when people see us they say, 'Man, they did that in under a year? All by themselves?' It's gratifying."