Eighth-grade metal band signs $1.78 million contract with Sony

Not bad for kids who aren't in high school yet.

Unlocking the Truth, a heavy metal band out of Brooklyn, just signed a 5-album deal with Sony that could beworth $1.78 million.

The unusual thing is that the band members aren't even out of eighth grade yet.

Malcolm Brickhouse, 13, Alec Adkins, 13, and Jarad Dawkins, 12, spent last summer playing music in Times Square.

This year, they became the youngest group ever to perform on the main stage at Coachella.

Now they're getting ready for the big time.

"To me, we have our own customized genre," Dawkins told the Village Voice. "Our music is different than other types of metal bands. I would put it as 'custom metal.'"

"During the week we do our homework and go to school and at nighttime, I would say around 5 o'clock, we would practice our instruments," Atkins said of balancing schoolwork with rock. "And on the weekend, we would have serious, hardcore band practice."

Brickhouse and Dawkins formed the band two years ago, when they were just 10 and 11. Shortly after making their debut at an amateur night at the Apollo Theatre, the boys decided they needed bass player. So they asked Atkins to join the band — and then taught him how to play the bass.

The band found fast success on YouTube.

Now that their voices have dropped — initially, their singing voices weren't "mature" enough for metal — they're all taking voice lessons.

Last year, they won the first round of AfroPunk 2013's Battle of the Bands. This year, they opened for Guns N' Roses at the Vegas Hard Rock. They're currently touring the country with the Vans Warped Tour.

"We're planning to go into the studio as soon as we're off Warped Tour," the band's manager, Alan Sacks, told Rolling Stone. "The boys have their music written, so we're in good shape. We're just finalizing those situations right now. Metallica also reached out to us to get us booked on the Heavy MTL festival [in August]."

Steve Jordan, Eric Clapton's drummer, discovered the trio playing in Washington Park Square in 2012. The band is managed by Brickhouse's mother, Annette Jackson, and Sacks, the co-creator of "Welcome Back Kotter."

The Sony deal includes two guaranteed albums and another possible four, if the label chooses to make them.

Their first recording includes a promised advance of $60,000. The second recording's advance could be as high as $350,000. If Sony wants all six albums, Unlocking the Truth could rake in up to $1.78 million.

The only catch: to make real money, their first album needs to sell more than 250,000 copies.

According to the New York Post, which spoke to Sacks, the deal also includes 16 to 17 per cent royalties, a slightly higher-than-average fee.

Entertainment attorney Richard Wolfe called the deal "impressive" for artists without a track record.

"It's so exciting. We're jumping over the moon," Dawkins' mother, Tabatha, told the New York Daily News.

"We motivate people to do positive, more constructive things with their life," Brickhouse told the Village Voice. "You know, we're so young, and other people think that because they're a certain age they can't do something."

"I'm so excited! We've made it!" Dawkins told the New York Post.

"I never thought that taking these kids to see WWE Wrestling and watching Japanese cartoons would inspire them to play heavy metal music. Sometimes ... I can’t sleep at night because there are so many things happening," Brickhouse's father, Tracey, told ABC News.

"I sleep and I eat and I drink these kids, it might sound like I am bragging about these kids, but I am the proudest dad in the world. Sometimes I have to pinch myself, it's like a dream come true. They are talented, they work hard, they deserve everything that is happening."