On a sunny day in October, Andy Schirm looks out to the audience and smiles. Schirm, lead singer of Rubicon Crossing, and his two bandmates played at the Battle of the Bands on Tuesday. Chris English sways back and forth as he rocks out on the guitar. Nathan Pilcher batters the drum set.

Thirty minutes before the band members went on stage, they were joking around and having a good time, and seemed to be completely unfazed by the thought of performing.

Pilcher, senior in construction engineering, says he wasn’t nervous about performing.

“Anxiousness is more like it,” he says.

The band calmly sets up the stage while talking to one another. Pilcher teases Schirm about polishing his shiny guitar 15 times the night before.

Watching the members of the band interact, a presence of closeness can be felt.

“We all went to high school together,” says Schirm, junior in management. “We were all in a bunch of bands, but we were never in the same band at the same time. Then we all went to Iowa State. Since we all went to the same school, we decided to start a band.”

English says the band hasn’t been together very long, and the members named their band Rubicon Crossing after a list of names that didn’t fit.

“Rubicon Crossing comes from the expression ‘to cross the Rubicon,'” says English, sophomore in pre-journalism and mass communication. “It means to cross a river or to make a decision. It’s taking a big stride in your life. Before, we played in bands that were nothing. Writing and performing together was our big decision. This is our one chance, not to make it big, but to write music we will be proud of.”

The band takes its time with writing songs, but English says he believes it should take a long time. If a band can write a lot of songs in one night, it isn’t putting enough time into its songs, he says.

There are a lot of accusations directed at the band by certain listeners, English says.

“We don’t write our music on drugs,” English says. “A lot of people sometimes ask us. I would really stress the fact that even though we put a lot of emotion and feeling into our music, drugs aren’t a factor at all. To us, that’s kind of an assumption fad that goes around and we try hard to steer against.”

Pilcher says he remembers the band’s first show, which was at an open mic night. The band has done several shows since and the members are never hesitant to point out the good and bad highlights of the act.”Immediately after the show, we get together and say what we think went well and not so well,” English says, “We’re really good friends, so one of us can say, ‘Man, that really sucked’ and nobody will get offended.”

After putting away the equipment, Schirm leaves on urgent business and English and Pilcher stick around for food. They get hamburgers and hot dogs and start reminiscing about high school and the crazy things they did.

“When we were in high school, we broke into the band room and constructed a 20-foot tower of music stands,” English says.

Pilcher says he remembers that, and they laugh together as good friends do.