"Wait, are we in Williamsburg?" asked a confused young woman standing impatiently in line to see the Honey Brothers. No, as it turned out, she was not. She was in Manhattan, outside the Mercury Lounge. Indeed, the excitable, slightly-crazed and overheated fans (mostly female) who had come from far and wide to catch HBO darling Adrian Grenier play with his band, the Honey Brothers, seemed slightly discombobulated. They waited amid a sea of disaffected cowboy-boot wearers and angular-haircut sporters, who were forced to step around their line on Houston Street. But once inside, and after Adrian and his band-mates took to the stage, it was clear that the fans knew exactly where they were. "I want to have sex with you!" they yelled. "Oh, my God, he's so hot," they cried. "He doesn't even have to try!" they said. They were, of course, referring to Grenier. (When we told Grenier that his female fans were getting really randy, he sternly looked us in the eye and said, "That's not funny.")
The 29-year-old actor turned musician (but don't worry, still an actor) is famous for his portrayal of Vince Chase on the HBO hit Entourage. It's the story of a dude from Queens who moves out to Hollywood to become a big-time movie star. Vince's buddies from Queens -- his entourage -- go along for the ride. This isn't too far of a stretch for the Brooklyn-born Grenier. But unlike his aloof and cardboardlike character on the show, Grenier is smart, witty, sweet, decidedly blasé about fame and celebrity and, among other things, a really good drummer. But let's not talk about Adrian Grenier for a moment. Because Grenier was not in the picture in early 2003 when Columbia grads Ari Gold (who coincidentally shares his name with Grenier's slavering agent on Entourage, played by Jeremy Piven), Andrew Vladeck and Daniel Posner started playing music in Gold's living room. From the living room, the boys took their music to the streets and began walking down the Upper West Side, singing and playing ukuleles. Then, from the streets, they went back to the Living Room -- this time, a club on the Lower East Side. Starting a band seemed like the logical next step for Gold, a filmmaker; Vladeck, a singer-songwriter; and Posner, a psychiatrist. For a month in 2002, the brothers Honey played a midnight residency at the Living Room. During that time, Gold ran into Grenier (he had filmed the actor's documentary A Shot in the Dark about Grenier's search for his father, back in 2002) and invited him to see the band play. Taken with the Brothers, Adrian suggested that they record some songs in his basement. At that point the Honey Brothers were in the market for a drummer and a bassist; they turned to Adrian and his friend Pierre Michel, respectively. (A sad side note: Pierre tragically drowned in August of last year while kayaking on a lake in Massachusetts.)
