The Vacancies - Just a bunch of average Joes.

Though they don't strictly fit into the genre, the Vacancies are perhaps the most significant punk band to come out of Cleveland in the last decade. The band's resume includes recent tours with punk stalwarts like Pennywise, the Circle Jerks and the Adolescents, and it's booked for a few Warped Tour dates this summer. It's also just about to release Tantrum, its second album for Joan Jett's Blackheart Records. Getting its foot into the industry's proverbial door hasn't been easy, however.

"We've gotten respect but at the same time, I don't know," Billy Crooked says one afternoon as he and the guys (guitarist Michael James, bassist Bo, drummer Kevin Hopkins and guitarist Dave Long) have gathered for a pre-rehearsal cocktail at Lakewood's Mars Bar. "The club owners have been great to us, but people aren't being turned away at the door when we play. Overall, I have nothing to complain about. But the local bands that play punk or anything in that genre only get a handful of friends to come to the show. If you go to the Warped tour, you see 8,000 kids, and I just wonder where they are the rest of the time. I'm not saying we're the greatest band. But I just don't know why they're only there for the big shows. It's kind of a puzzle. Are we not reaching the people?"

The band's efforts to "reach the people" began in the late '90s when it was known as Jimmy Spider and the Vacancies, an act that owed as much to the glam rock of Bowie and T. Rex as it did to punk traditions. Jimmy Spider was supposed to be a fictional character but when singer Danny Frye adopted the moniker as his stage name, the rest of the guys decided to part ways. They split up the songs and made Billy the singer, while Frye went on to a semi-successful solo career that came to a tragic end a few years ago when he passed away.

"We had a hidden record," Billy says of that era. "It never came out but everyone who heard it thinks it's great."

The band then went through another line-up change and put out its debut, Gut Punch, in 2002 on Smog Veil Records, a label more known for reissuing old Cleveland punk bands than for releasing young new acts. It sent a copy of that disc off to Joan Jett with the hopes of securing a contract with her label. Jett liked what she heard.

"I saw them play and thought they were really great. We did a few more shows and I told them if they wanted to do another CD, we'd like to put it out on Blackheart Records. I got a chance to produce it, and it was a lot of fun. They play great, everyday-person punk-rock stuff that's very accessible," she told me in an interview last year. She invited the guys to open for her in Cleveland and Cincinnati. That's when drummer Sean Watkins went AWOL, leaving the band in the lurch.

"He was in AA and he would tell us, "If I ever start fucking up and start stealing your shit, kick me out,'" James recalls. "He just didn't show up. We're still friends with him, but that was it."

The band had to cancel the Cleveland show and found a last-minute replacement in Angelo Merendino (since replaced by Kevin Hopkins) for the Cincy show.

"I got an earful from Kenny Laguna, who's the president of Blackheart Records," Billy recalls. "He was like, "What happened to you guys? You don't cancel a show with us.' I got a lecture."

"We're lucky they still wanted to put out our record," James says. "It was a horrible show. It was 98 degrees outside and the guitars had been sitting out for three hours in the sun and needed tuning. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Joan sitting behind the PA singing along to my songs as we were sucking. It was one of the coolest moments of my life."

The band wasn't finished trying to convince Laguna it was for real. When it came to producing their Blackheart debut, 2005's A Beat Missing or a Silence Added, he was originally unimpressed. The guys recall seeing him sending text messages on his phone while working in the studio. But eventually he came around and ended up taking an interest in the group, which recorded with him for a week in New York.

"At first, we were Joan's little project," Billy says. "I think we won him over. By the end, he came to life and started telling us cool stories. It was definitely a good time."

"[Laguna and Jett] didn't really change anything," James says. "It was more encouraging than anything. They just wanted to get a good vibe. She's super nice and had no ego. It's easy to be comfortable around her."

For Tantrum, the guys had to again convince Laguna and Jett to cut it some slack. They wanted to record in Cleveland at the Lava Room and even though Laguna and Jett didn't like the idea, they went along with it.

"We didn't want to do the New York thing," James says. "We wanted to do it in Cleveland. We have been around awhile and we showed them we could handle it."

The album took two months as the guys kept their day jobs and worked on it after hours at the studio. With references to the city's poverty ("Compound"), the disc captures the desperation you often find in a Midwestern city that's seen better days.

"The thing about being down-and-out surfaces a lot in the record," Billy says. "That's why the album cover is a close-up of a mouth biting down on a quarter."

Dave Long contributed to the tune "Hand of Fear" after a run-in with a few aggro cops at a Kent State rally designed to mark the anniversary of the May 4 shootings.

"The students are responsible but the police are responsible, too," he says. "That's what that song is about."

It's all part of the simmering rage that fuels the aptly titled Tantrum.

"I don't know the first thing about politics," Billy says. "I pay attention to the news and try to keep up. It interests me and frustrates me. I don't know that anyone really understands it. It's all a vague thing. Instead of trying to be super intellectual, which I'm not, it's more about an average Joe talking about what's going on."

Regardless of Billy's disclaimers, the album has a Clash-like sensibility that comes through effectively on everything from the aforementioned "Compound" to the moralistic "Sick Modern Era." It's what's given the band its classic punk reputation. As a result, the guys have ended up on bills with old-school punk bands, something they say makes for a good challenge.

"Anytime you play for teenagers and you play for your peers, it's easier to win the teenagers over," Billy says, whose Adolescents T-shirt speaks to his affinity for the veteran acts. "They want to hear new music and new stuff. They're not jaded and tired of hearing punk band after punk band. It's harder to play for their crowds, but it's very inspiring. There's just some kind of magic in watching a guy like the Circle Jerks' Keith Morris. He doesn't jump around and do back flips like every fuckin' band nowadays. But every word that came out of his mouth was just so intense. It's cool, but it just makes it hard for us."

"Yeah, we're like the Cheap Trick of punk rock," James adds. "We've become the opening band for the throwback band."