With the release of the band's latest CD, "Basic Guidelines to Making Enemies," members of 5606 are hoping it's only a matter of time before their visions become reality.

"This is weird, but the three of us have really big imaginations," Ventimiglia says. "Some of the biggest shows we've ever played were in that garage. It's funny because people make fun of us, but we psych ourselves into it, and I think we actually start to believe the things that we do in there."

The band's album will be released in mid- April online and at some local stores such as Hot Topic. With its release, the band hopes to acquire a deal with a record label.

"We're pretty proud of every single track on this album," Ventimiglia says. "We dare people to find the bad song on this CD."

Those punk fans looking to get a jump on the scene can pick up the CD early at 5606's CD release show on March 31 at the Saratoga Rec Center. It will be playing with bands I Am Ghost, My Former Self, My Own Victory, Altruist and Aquabox, and the show is sure to sell out.

Ventimiglia started the band with a couple of friends when he was 15.

"At first it started out as being a Friday night ritual of chicken garlic pizza from Round Table and playing songs," he says.

Once the band started writing enough original material, it started playing at community centers and local venues such as the former Cactus Club.

"God rest its soul," Ventimiglia adds.

Since its beginnings, the band's had a few personnel changes, with drummer Kevin Bligh and bassist Anthony Greene now joining guitarist and lead singer Ventimiglia.

Greene and Bligh grew up together in Willow Glen, near Curtner and Meridian avenues. The two even went to St. Francis High School together. The band often practices in the Greene family's garage.

Ventimiglia hails from downtown San Jose and went to Pioneer High School.

While members dedicate a tremendous amount of time to the band, Ventimiglia also works at Grande's Pizzeria downtown, and Bligh works at San Jose Pro Drum in Willow Glen. Greene was just about to start culinary school in San Francisco when Ventimiglia and Bligh contacted him about joining the band. He decided to stay in the South Bay to give it a shot.

Up and coming

In the past couple of years, 5606 has managed to go from playing at the Cactus Club in San Jose to playing larger venues such as last year's San Francisco Vans Warped Tour, one of the most successful North American concert tours. It has played alongside successful rock groups such as Yellowcard, Alien Ant Farm, Fall Out Boy and more. It even received accolades from the biggest bands in the industry, such as Green Day and Good Charlotte.

To find out why 5606 is becoming so popular, just go to one of its shows and look at the crowd, says friend and fellow musician Travis Hatfield.

"Everything is so powerful that everyone has to move," he says. "You never see one person not moving at a 5606 show."

The band members have no qualms about admitting their talent.

"We practice a lot, and I can confidently say we play really tightly together," Ventimiglia says. "We're not a sloppy band. We do what we do well."

The quality sound and infectious songs appeal to just about anyone, even if a listener is not into punk rock, Ventimiglia says.

"Forty-year-old parents will come up to us and say they don't like the music their children listen to, but they like our band," he says, "and that's like a really weird compliment, that we can appeal to that many people."

It's likely the group can attribute at least some of its success to natural talent. Ventimiglia has been developing his gift for music since the age of 10.

"When I was a kid, we had a harmonium, an electric organ, and for some reason we had these church sheets out," he says. "I was able to read musical notation without any training, and that's when my parents me put me in piano lessons."

The members of 5606, however, say it's been hard work, not just natural abilities, that's taken them this far.

"It never stops-- I don't watch TV, and we don't even have friends," Ventimiglia says. "If you want to be the best, you better act like the best. We're always promoting, always online, doing the best we can because it'd be horrible to think we're going somewhere with this and not putting in our best effort."

Hatfield confirms that the guys of 5606 spend more time practicing than with friends.

"Every time I call you, it's like, 'I gotta call you back, I'm doing something for the band,' " Hatfield says to Ventimiglia with a laugh.

The band members practice relentlessly, together and on their own. Their songs come together when one person comes in with an idea, and then the band modifies the sound.

"There's no set formula at all; it's a bunch of mumbo jumbo stuff," Greene says, while plucking his bass.

"It's just little ideas, like, 'Wouldn't it be cool if we had a song like this?' " he says emphatically, as he throws himself back in his seat and plays his unplugged bass with the pained expression of a true rock star. "And then it's like, 'Oh, sweet, I'll top it off with this.' "

Ventimiglia agrees that there's nothing too deep about their music.

"We're not out there to change the world; we're just trying to help people have a good time," he says.

Future rockers

Though 5606 was around before its members could legally drive, it wasn't until recently that things started to get serious for the group.

"A lot of people say the name's been around for so long, but the band's been reinvented-- this is the real 5606, this is a new generation," Ventimiglia says.

He says the band's last CD, "Don't Call it a Comeback EP," was the catalyst for its current momentum. It was the band's first release "made with the intention of mass listenage," as Greene puts it, and managed to sell more than 32,000 copies.

The band expects even more from its newest release--namely, to get signed to a record label.

"When you put your body and soul into something so much, if you didn't get anything back from it, you'd just be devastated, so we're all pretty sure something going to come out of this," Ventimiglia says.

Along with its two studio-recorded CDs, 5606 also has six unofficial albums.

"We put together demos and EPs before, which no one will ever hear, but they'll never leave my iPod," Ventimiglia says.

EPs, or "extended play" discs, are CDs too short to be albums, but too long to be singles.

As the band became more experienced, Ventimiglia says, it became evident 5606 could some day be more than just a local band.

"It wasn't about who we could play with anymore; it was more about pulling our own weight," Ventimiglia says. "Little by little, we saw that the draw for our shows was getting better and better."

Even though Greene was not in the band at the time, he recalls, "People would start coming who didn't even know the band that well; they just knew that if it was 5606, it was going to be a good show."

That's exactly what happened last July, when 5606 played the Clear Channel and radio station 104.9 Day in the San Jose Meadow concert. While the popular band Slightly Stoopid played the main stage, 5606 played the stage for local bands.

"It was this little, small, piece of crap side stage," Ventimiglia says. "It was basically two tables put together, and there was no security."

Even though 5606 was clearly not as well known, it managed to outdraw the main stage, bringing in thousands of fans, Ventimiglia says. Security was shifted from the main stage to the side stage for the show.

"It was that moment--it was that show--when we set ourselves apart in our hometown," Ventimiglia says.

That defining moment came on the heels of a flurry of publicity the band had received in a matter of months. It started when a member of the extremely popular band Good Charlotte somehow stumbled upon 5606's page on the website MySpace.com. Through MySpace, Good Charlotte told fans to check out 5606. Within 48 hours, more than 30,000 people added themselves to 5606's friend list on MySpace.com.

"That's enough to make people's head turn twice, like, 'What's going on with this band?' " Ventimiglia says.

The members of 5606 say they still don't know how Good Charlotte discovered the group.

"We've never met them, but we're in eternal debt to them," Ventimiglia says.

5606's MySpace page became so popular that for a few days it got more hits than sites featuring Green Day, Fall Out Boy and Good Charlotte, according to My
Space website statistics.

MySpace continued to give the band new exposure. Green Day band member Tre Cool listed 5606 as "band of the week" on his personal MySpace page, and a few weeks later, a banner promoting 5606 was added to the band's site, Greenday.net.

"We want to get 5606 to the masses," Ventimiglia says. "I don't care if people call us sellouts. Sellout just means more people know about your band."

With a solid fanbase established through MySpace, 5606 was able to earn a spot on the Warped Tour.

Ventimiglia says the extent of the band's success was never as clear to him as it was when it toured with the band Yellowcard.

"That was out of control," he says. "You step out onto the stage, and there's almost like this gust of wind.

"When there's that many people, you can honestly feel it push you back, and you're like, whoa," he adds. "It's awesome. I don't do drugs, but I pretty much figure that's what drugs would be like because you just want more of it."

More recently, 5606 was selected by the Academy of Art University in San Francisco to be featured in a student-directed music video. The video will be on the band's MySpace page April 10. It was filmed at the restaurant Peggy Sue's in San Pedro Square, after everything had closed down. Band members asked all of their fans to come out to be extras.

The video is about three guys who work at a restaurant, though they don't particularly want to. When the restaurant closes, they hold a concert there.

"I actually used to work at that restaurant, so that was kind of special," Greene says.

Putting a video together at the familiar restaurant was a whole other experience.

"It's a lot tougher than you think it is," Greene says. "I remember after one scene I was sweating on my face, so I patted off my face, and this lady comes back and she puts sweat back on my face.

"I'm like, 'What are you doing?' " he continues, "and she's like, 'You sweated in that scene, you need to be sweaty again in this scene.' "

Though they've had more success than most local bands can claim, Ventimiglia says 5606 is far from finished.

"We want world domination," he says. "When people go to shows, they're coming back. We're like a disease; we don't go away."

The 5606 CD Release Party for its new album will be at the Saratoga Rec Center, 19655 Allendale Ave., in Saratoga on March 31 at 6:30 p.m. Tickets are $10. To learn more, visit www.myspace.com/5606 or www.5606live.com.