Prey For Rock & Roll is a movie about a rock band, not a movie about rock stars, nor is it about how, with spunk, talent and determination and the big break, they make it big. It is about the reality of being a musician in a working band, lots of effort, little reward.

A low-budget, shot on digital video indie movie, Prey For Rock & Roll is one of the best rock movies I've seen because it keeps its focus on the band and their music, and has a gripping realism that most movies about the music biz don't have. The movie is about a LA punk rock band "Clam Dandy" who have been circulating around the club scene for a long time, and like Courtney Love, what seems like rock & roll fun when you're 22 isn't so much when you're 40. Gershon's character, Traci is turning 40, and wondering if she can keep going with the rock & roll thing.

Based on a play by Cheri Lovedog, and with music written by Stephen Trask, who co-wrote Hedwig and the Angry Inch, the movie stars Gina Gershon, Lori Petty, Drea De Matteo and Shelly Cole as the band. Marc Blucas, (best known as Riley from season 4 of BtVS) is cast as Animal, the recently released from prison brother of the drummer, Sally. Adding to the authenticity, all four played their own instruments during the performance scenes, and Gina Gershon did the vocals on the soundtrack. Unlike most movies about rock bands, the songs by the band sound like a struggling club band, they're not bad, they are just okay. I couldn't help but think of The Light of Day, the Joan Jett and Michael J. Fox movie about a bar band, which had the title song written by Bruce Springsteen. Apparently Gershon took guitar lessons from Joan Jett for this role, but curiously, no mention of Jett is made in the movie or the commentary. Especially since they got a clip of X from The Decline of Western Civilization, the documentary by Penelope Spheeris of the LA hardcore scene ("well, we're not rich, but we've got enough money for the needles and ink").

The movie's origin as a play shows in the structure, characters enter and exit the stage, and when they're not playing, there's dialogue, lots and lots of dialogue, heavily salted with some voice overs. There are some uses of creative cinematography, especially a scene in a club between Traci and Animal which is just shots of their mouths and ears (y'know how you have to talk in a loud club, shouting into each other's ears).

One song, Every Six Minutes is played in its entirety, and is a brilliant dramatic use of a performance, not only the song, but the actual performance of it.

To promote the movie, Gina Gershon went on tour with the band Girls Vs Boys, and made a documentary about the tour, coming out later this month on DVD. The DVD of Prey For Rock & Roll includes a commentary by director Alex Steyermark.