Cody Gill

The Cody Gill Band began as a group of small town boys from Stephenville, Texas with little in common except for the city where they were from and their love of music. Having outlived the local bar where they played their first show, and with the release of their second album, The Cody Gill Band knows what it means to be a King of Your Hometown.

The group was formed in March of 2004 when a high-school junior, two nearly-graduated college students, and a South Texas oil field worker teamed up for a one-night-only jam. Richie Petronis was a student at Texas A&M University when he ran into oil-man-by-day/open-mike-performer-by-night, Cody Gill, in College Station, Texas. Cody had been in search of the right band to back his musical drive for a good while at the time. Richie was learning to play the drums and had a friend from high school, Zack Hooper, who was a skilled jazz-guitarist in the Tarleton State University Jazz Band. A trio was formed for an upcoming solo gig that Cody had scheduled for the following week in their hometown of Stephenville. Zack’s younger brother, Caleb (still just a junior in high school) was in Colorado when he received a call from Zack asking him to play bass guitar in his band. On the night of their first gig the yet-to-be-named Cody Gill Band was asked by a listener in the crowd to play another show the following weekend. Through high school football and oil company schedules, the band performed together, and two years later Jarrod Baker, a jazzed-trained drummer and Stephenville resident joined the group.

In 2007, their debut full-length album Boxcars was released by Smith Entertainment Records. The single “Can’t Let Her Go” spent near 9 months on the Texas Music Chart. A year later, The Cody Gill Band began recording and co-producing their second full-length album, King of Your Hometown, with LD Whitehead. The new album, slated to be released in February of 2009 by Smith Entertainment, consists of 9 original songs penned by all members of the band and 2 tunes written by others, “Moving On” written by Marshall Owens and “Threw Me Away” written by Jeremy Harlow. The title track, “King of Your Hometown,” is a good-hearted, satirical memoir of sorts created by the band’s frontman, Cody Gill. Rock ballad and melodical fantasies such as Gill’s “Crumble” and Zack Hooper’s “Consider” are well-complimented by Caleb Hooper’s Honky Tonk inspired “Heart in the Middle” and a return of a live-audience favorite previously unreleased since the band’s early EP, “18 in Mexico.” The soaring guitars, powerful vocals, driving drums and interwoven bass grooves of these highlighted songs along with the other seven are sure to fulfill all of The Cody Gill Band’s diehard fans’ hunger for more and draw even more attention around Texas and the rest of the world.

Since its genesis, The Cody Gill Band has grown into a successful musical group with undeniable drive and relentless love for a wide range of music from other Texas country and southern rock artists like Reckless Kelly and Cross Canadian Ragweed to other genres and artists such as blues legends Government Mule and the folk-rock stylings of Bob Dylan and Neil Young. The Cody Gill Band takes the stage with a chemistry and family-like attitude not commonly found in any profession. Long hours on the road and days away from the norm bring out the truest of emotions, only to fuel the already-blazing fire dwelling in the underbelly of this nomadic foursome.

To find more about the Cody Gill Band, go to www.codygillmusic.com, www.myspace.com/codygillband, or www.smithmusic.com.