The members of Brooks Wood Band sit side by side like brothers.

They laugh and play around, throwing punches and cracking up. Their red faces are buried in their hands as they try to hold back laughter caused from another inside joke.

They have been a band for two years and friends for even longer, tracing back to their undergraduate years at N.C. State.

Brooks Wood, lead vocals and guitar, Miah Wander, bass player, Paul Sheerin, lead guitar, Danny Shampine, drummer, and Greg Holzer, keyboardist, all make up the acoustic rock band Brooks Wood Band, which has soul and funk influences.

They might be jokesters, but these guys are serious about their music. When it comes to the perfect career, nothing could be sweeter than being a musician, at least for these five.

“We want to make it a career,” Wood said.

With time, effort and serious plans, the band members feel the music they produce is always progressing.

“I think we all are finding with every song we write it is a little bit better than the last,” Wander said.

They play together, practice together and Sheerin and Wander even live together. Although the band members are as close as people can be, they have their rough spots.

“Families fight too,” Sheerin said as he laughed.

Wood said they try to spend some time away from one another to keep down the tension.

Like most families, each member of the band brings a different personality to the group as a whole. According to the band mates, Wood is the “spirithead and networker.” Sheerin is creative and “makes cool s**t happen.” Shampine is the “jester” — he can’t stop rolling out the jokes and smart comments. Wander is the man who “makes live shows as exciting as possible.”

With that array of personalities, the band has stories that are both good, bad and funny.

One of the band member’s favorite stories is an incident which happened at a venue in Emerald Isle. The band was playing a regular-sized gig when a “very drunk” woman in the audience decided she wanted to be the lead singer.

“She pushed me and Brooks out of the way,” Wander said laughing, “then said ‘I’m the damn band.'”

Eventually Wander took the woman off the stage, and as he did, she flicked off the whole band. Even now, the band cannot stop laughing about the incident.

The band members said they love to perform, even with the bad and awkward incidences.

“The more people we have at our shows the better we play,” Wander said.

Wood said he loves to play around Raleigh, and they are all excited about their upcoming performance this Friday at 8 p.m. at The Brewery. The Brewery is hosting a “Back to School Party,” a live music event welcoming back students from NCSU and from colleges around the Triangle.

“One of our best shows was at The Brewery,” Wood said. “This show is really important to us.”

Also playing with Brooks Wood Band is Big City Reverie, The Motion and The Old Regime.