Elvis Is Coming

Brain Bucket's song “You Rock ’n’ Roll,” from the band’s new album, is featured in the upcoming film Lonely Street.

“It’s about the ‘Second Coming’ of Elvis,” says guitarist Chris Kelly. “It stars Jay Mohr, Joe Mantegna, and Nikki Cox — a superior helping of B-list stars if ever I’ve seen one.”

According to Kelly, “There are two direct routes into the movie music biz: one, you get real lucky or, two, you know someone. In my case, my cousin Patrick Newall was one of the producers of the movie. There was another actual music supervisor, and several other producers had to okay the song too, so I don’t want to sell it too short and say it was all in the connections. But it kind of was.…

“Payment for things like this really varies,” says Kelly. “You can get some money up front; how much depends on your stature. Then, you get standard royalty rates each time it’s played somewhere in the movies or on TV.…

“I’ve had some songs in smaller indie movies. I got a check for about 80 bucks a year for a couple years for each of them. When you get the check, it’s pretty cool; it shows where the movie was played. I’m really quite well known now in Burma and Indonesia. [Lonely Street] has some bigger stars and should have a larger release. I stand to make, literally, hundreds of dollars.”

Kelly attended a preview of Lonely Street in L.A., held in late August. He says he liked the film, though he finds the premise of Elvis’s “Second Coming” far-fetched.

“Elvis went out as toast on a toilet; a toasted crapper.”