In 1991, the newly formed band Zwarte arrived in New York City to make its first album. With all the excitement of making rock-'n'-roll came a realization.

The band was broke.

Instead of sleeping in a hotel, where the establishment wanted an unheard of $200, the group slept in an extended cab pickup, which also boasted a topper. Seven guys - on the floor, on the seats, in the bed of the pickup - dreaming away in the parking lot at the Statue of Liberty. The next morning, excitement ran high when they discovered the monument's bathrooms had hot water.

The band left New York City with its self-entitled debut, complete with the songs "Lucy" and "Easy Street." And with the songs in hand came recognition that spread to a regional level. Next came the road crew, and good gigs. It wasn't long until the band actually went home with more money than it spent.

It was a new Zwarte that walked into Bismarck's Salon 613 for a day of pampering - and in one musician's case, his first introduction to a salon - and, as the band emerges onto the national scene, new realizations.

The band is on fire.

The Randall Zwarte Band is a hybrid of the old Zwarte, which included current members Eddie Filarecki and Randall Zwarte, and Tom Chrz and George Welder of the former band, Junk. Randall Zwarte the man said the groups "duct taped" themselves together on Jan. 7, and there's been something new every day since.

"Out of a dozen years of playing, there's nothing like it going on," he said.

Chrz, the bassist, and Welder, the drummer, live in Bismarck. Zwarte said they represent "the tightest rhythm section" he's ever heard. Zwarte lives in Dell Rapids, S.D., and does part press relations, part gig-booking and sponsor-finding and all lead vocals. Filarecki, "the fastest guitar player this side of the Mississippi," resides in Sturgis, S.D.

The group stumbled on some good luck recently. While playing at the Daytona, Fla., motorcycle rally, Spike TV filmed their on-stage antics. Shortly after, the band's manager, Randy Ricci, got in touch with Jeremy J. Ford, producer of MTV's The Real World and Road Rules. Ford had always wanted to do a reality show highlighting the "behind the scenes" of a band's life, and Ricci knew just the band to do it.

The Randall Zwarte Band's every move is recorded on camera, Ricci wielding a handheld JVC and Ron Morin, a contractor for Ford, sporting a Sony and a tripod. The footage will eventually be compiled and edited and molded into "The Road to Sturgis," chronicling the band's journey from Daytona to the Sturgis motorcycle rally this summer. While the show is intended to be a movie, the worst-case scenarios are a series of reality shows or a video distributed by Blockbuster. Yeah, that's the worst-case scenario.

The guys congregate on Thursday nights to play through Saturday. Then they spread out to their different corners of the Dakotas, back to their day jobs. The Bismarck pair are both employed at Pride, Inc., Zwarte works with Ricci on promoting the band and Filarecki, fast-fingers himself, is a roofer. Just describing his work makes Ricci cringe.

"I have a lot of time on my hands," Filarecki said, "I figured I would get a really dangerous job and bug our management company."

Filarecki sipped white zinfandel wine at the salon, but said he's normally a whiskey drinker. "That'll come later," with the "blue collar, tax paying" fans who listened and sang and danced with the band at Borrowed Buck's Roadhouse on Saturday night. Some of whom, Zwarte said, can outdrink him. The band doesn't live up to the true biker-band standard, Zwarte said, but its song "Sturgis" has made it popular with the Harley crowd.

Bismarck is just part of the two-year touring blur for Zwarte. Unprecedented perhaps, Filarecki said. But they're happy doing what they like to do - "out on the road, wearing our boots, kickin' butt and rock-'n'-rollin'."

The members are doing what they like to do, with people they don't mind being with. Although Filarecki jokes that he stays as far away from the rest of the guys as possible - he ends up doing crazy things like getting his hair done and cut when they're together - he and Zwarte insist they're all very laid back. Obviously the case as the four succumbed to shampoos and massages before Saturday's show. Fate has done them a great favor, not only putting them within reach of their dreams but in getting the band together.

Filarecki joined the original Zwarte unit near its inception when a member didn't show up for a couple of shows. At a show last year, Zwarte heard someone screaming out AC/DC near the dressing room. With Filarecki, Zwarte went to hunt down the man behind the voice. It was Welder.

When the original bassist and drummer departed the band - they were going in different directions, but it wasn't a messy breakup, Filarecki insists - Welder was a natural choice. And not just because of the voice. At his first live music show, a 12-year old Welder stole a Zwarte poster and put it in his room. He's wanted to be a drummer ever since.

The group has been blessed, Filarecki said, to have members that not only know their limits and their jobs, but members who add their own charisma to making music, to entertaining.

"With the lineup we have, I'm still waiting to find out what's the catch," Zwarte said. "It's just rock-'n'-roll, not rocket science."

Life has been a rollercoaster ride since the band's Daytona show and since filming began. The group tries to think of a negative aspect, a moment perhaps caught on camera that shows how tense things can get when always on the go. But no one can come up with anything.

"How about we call you when we have our first down?" Ricci said.

(Reach reporter Angie Buckley at 250-8255 or angiebuckley@ndonline.com)