The first two things a listener should notice on the new "Quit Music" CD by local band Meeting of Important People is the confident songcraft and strong production. So it's hard to believe that the band developed out of a youthful insecurity on the part of frontman/guitarist Josh Verbanets.

According to him, MOIP is a reconstituted version of The You, a power-pop outfit that lasted until 2005 ("we broke up due to bad record deals, and me not knowing how to communicate"). Shortly thereafter, his friend Greg Dutton invited him into the nascent incarnation of roots-pop band Lohio.

"I love Greg and his songwriting, but it was a bit of a social scene. I always thought a band was [suspect] if 200 people came to see them because they played soccer in high school. There's nothing wrong with that, but I was jealous because I was insecure. I didn't realize that being in a band can hold a positive function of allowing people in their mid-20s to still hang out."

Lohio became the most congenial band experience Mr. Verbanets ever had, to the point where their friends (in groups such as Donora, Shade, and Triggers) co-organized a series of shows and a compilation called "Key Party" where they would sing each other's compositions.

During a period in which Lohio needed fresh songs, Mr. Verbanets added his tunes to the setlist. Noticing that the frontman of The You was once again at the mic, now-defunct local band The Great Ants asked him to reform his old group.

"I said The You doesn't exist anymore, but I'd put something together to play. [Lohio drummer] Matt Miller loved all the songs I'd written, so while Lohio was our serious band, Meeting of Important People started out as a house party band."

When bassist Aaron Bubenheim (of The Resistors/Br'er Fox) joined, Mr. Verbanets suddenly found himself playing with two of his best friends. With not enough time to pursue both of his bands, Mr. Dutton recruited a new lineup, while MOIP released their first CD in 2009. Traveling to promote the release, they played more than 30 shows in the East, Midwest and Canada, even being detained at the border and nearly sent home -- a rite of passage for any rock band.

To stir up some Internet buzz, the trio produced a video for the song "Brittney Lane Don't Care," involving 40 local artists building an entire city out of cardboard in a Bloomfield warehouse. To date, the video has topped 55,000 plays on Youtube, but the online exposure didn't result in massive sales.

"It didn't make anyone download our record," Mr. Verbanets laments. "Why do you think OK Go is no longer on Capitol? Millions of people saw their video with the treadmills, but it didn't turn into anyone spending a dime. I was a bit confused that this was something people didn't latch onto after watching it."

Nonetheless, California indie label Authentik, owned by Scott Austin -- who ran Madonna's Maverick imprint in the '90s -- funded the video and the production of MOIP's new seven-song EP. It is a digital distributor, Mr. Verbanets explains, and makes nothing from physical CD sales, but its other expertise is song placement.

"We had songs on 'The Real World,' 'Ghost Whisperer' and 'Keeping Up With the Kardashians,' which still didn't do much for sales, but there's a chance they'll get us in a Coke ad and suddenly 100,000 people hear our music. It makes our moms and dads take us seriously because we're on a label that believes in us and has a yardstick of accomplishment."

Authentik shouldn't have too much difficulty marketing the accessible, generation-spanning material from the new EP. "Leap The Dips," the track WYEP seems most likely to add, sounds like an early The Who single (think "Pictures of Lily"), while "They Love Me In the City" mixes The Flaming Lips and "Pablo Honey"-era Radiohead, and "Big Muscles" dips into grunge and Weezer-ish power pop.

"Jesus Song," Mr. Verbanets' attempt at penning a straight gospel-pop tune ("it's not supposed to be pious, just impassioned"), evokes The Kinks. "Country Wife" concludes the disc with a Beach Boys vocal coda ("I'll go wherever she's been"), while their cover of "Come On Down to My Boat" (by '60s clean-cut rockers Every Mother's Son) is a song you might have heard on 3WS.

Much like the video, the "Quit Music" EP is a giveaway, free with admission to the band's two release parties at the Thunderbird Cafe ("we're the only band on the bill, so we'll throw in some covers of other local bands") and the all-ages event at the Andy Warhol Museum.

"I never expected all these things to happen to us in a million years," Mr. Verbanets says. "I didn't expect to get on a label, to play [New York-based music convention] CMJ or for WYEP to name us 'Local Band of the Year.' I would have hoped that it could propel us to do more with the band on a full-time basis, like touring more, having a stronger draw out of town, getting a booking agent. But that hasn't happened, so in a certain sense, we're in limbo."

According to Mr. Verbanets, the three band members bought houses along the river in Etna, Troy Hill and North Side proper, where real estate is affordable. They're right on the verge of experiencing the hometown lifestyle Joe Gruschecky describes in his famous "A Good Life" video from KDKA. "The other two guys have wives, but nobody has kids yet. Had we gotten to the level where we could draw 100 people in 15 cities, I could financially play music full time. It wouldn't take much -- we could support mortgages on that."

But so far, everyday reality ("marriage, lack of vacation days, going back to school") has prevented Meeting of Important People from mounting another full tour to support this EP. So what happens in the meantime?

"We hope that Authentik places these new songs in 'Grey's Anatomy' or 'Gossip Girl.' I know that's going to portray us as lazy bums sitting around. But the happiness we get from playing music has to be something that fits into our lives, and our lives are here in Pittsburgh with our families right now."

Critics Andrew Druckenbrod and Scott Mervis talk about music on "The Beat," available exclusively at PG+, a members-only web site of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Our introduction to PG+ gives you all the details.