The Graduates

Filmmaker Ryan Gielen had the idea for the coming-of-age film “The Graduates” (essentially, high school buddies travel to Ocean City for one last hurrah and female attention) as well as locations and a cast. What he didn’t have was money for music. Along with executive producer and brother Matthew Gielen, he posted a call for track submissions from independent musicians on MySpace, Craigslist, and the like. Among the 10,000 samples they received were a few the duo felt captured their story’s angsty roadtrip feel, including Plushgun, New Rags, and Sonia Montez.

“A lot of people find big hangups in music license for their films, so they have a friend do every song or use second tier scores,” Ryan said. “But there’s so much independent musician talent available that we wanted to create a situation that would be good for everybody.” His film’s exposure for use model can be seen and heard in screenings in New York, Austin, Chicago, and San Francisco early next year.