“The director said, ‘I’m looking for a young, hip rock ‘n’ roll band like Greta Van Fleet.’ And the producer’s like, ‘Well, I know someone…’” How Greta Van Fleet ended up in the new Bruce Springsteen biopic

Greta Van Fleet are making a big screen cameo in the highly anticipated Bruce Springsteen biopic, Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere.

Spoiler alert – there's a scene in which Jeremy Allen White as Springsteen joins a ‘local’ band at the Stone Pony in Asbury Park, New Jersey. Turns out, that band is actually made up of an all-star lineup, curated by the film's producer, Dave Cobb.

Jake Kiszka and Sam Kiszka from Greta Van Fleet are the fictional band's guitarist and bassist, while keyboardist Bobby Emmett from Jack White's band and Nashville drummer Askel Coe round up the line-up. The band delivers its own rendition of Little Richard’s Lucille and John Lee Hooker’s Boom Boom – performed alongside ‘Bruce’ – which are also included in the movie soundtrack.

“It’s interesting. It began through Dave Cobb; he produced the last Greta album (2023’s Starcatcher) and was helping me produce this current Mirador record,” Jake Kiszka explains in an interview with Billboard when asked about how the opportunity came about.

“We were sitting around on the dock out by the water at his house in Savannah (Georgia) and he said, ‘I’ve just been working on this Deliver Me From Nowhere film about Nebraska and Springsteen,’ and he said the director, Scott Cooper, was looking for a young band who could be the house band for the Stone Pony during this era of Springsteen.

Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere | Official Trailer - YouTube

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“And Scott said, ‘I’m really looking for a young, sort of hop rock ’n’ roll band like Greta Van Fleet.’ And Dave’s like, ‘Well, I know someone… Why don’t we just ask those guys?’ He asked me, and then he needed a bass player and guitar player, so Sam and I sort of stepped up to the plate. That’s how it began.”

Kiszka asserts that the cameo was “completely unexpected, but there’s been so many opportunities like this that come across through the grapevine”.

He continues, “A lot of this stuff it’s like, ‘OK, that’s cool, but we’re touring’ or doing a record, whatever we’re busy with at the time. This came through, and it was like, you definitely can’t say no to this because Bruce Springsteen is such a big influence on us.”

He went on to explain the recording process with White as Springsteen, which included going to the Power Station in New York, where the Boss actually recorded.

“Jeremy came in as well,” Kiszka relates. “It was really rough and tumble; we maybe got two or three passes on each song. The idea was we were gonna record (more) at the Stony Pony while we were filming, so we were under the impression of, ‘OK, let’s give this a go, give it our best,’ and ultimately have another go at it when we’re on the set and filming.”

However, the plans changed slightly when the Power Station recordings were approved (and lauded) by Springsteen himself – a dream for the Kiszka brothers.

“What happened is Bruce heard what we had recorded (in the studio) and he was so enamored with it and loved it so much that Scott Cooper decided we were gonna use those recordings from the Power Station in studio, which is quite cool,” Kiszka says.

And like every other music biopic in recent years, White had to put in the hours to learn guitar à la Springsteen – with a co-star revealing in a recent interview that he was lugging his guitar to other sets and secretly practicing.