About Gram

Gram is a name shared by more than one artist: 1) A German Black Metal band. Released "May I Never Hear Your Voices Again" full-length in 2009. 2) A Dutch indieband around Marg van Eenbergen (Gram is her first name, spelled backwards). Van Eenbergen gained prominence in the Dutch indie scene as the front woman of Amsterdam-based indie band Seedling. After Seedling's split in 2004, Van Eenbergen worked with Dutch band About and started working on her début album as Gram. Four-Letter Word (2008) was released to critical acclaim. The second (poppier!) Gram album, Play Me is set for release in October 2011. 3) A British electronic musician. Graham Love had been using Impulse Tracker to compose hip-hop and drum'n'bass influenced electronica for several years before German independent label Underscan put out his debut EP in 2002 as a limited vinyl release. He has since toured Switzerland with Underscan, appeared on a compilation for Underscan, and appeared on another compilation for Kraked. Lately he hasn't had enough time for music and has pretty much stopped producing. Gram stands for a Good Reason to Ask for More. Not to be confused with Gramm (aka Farben, Jan Jelinek). 4) A Brazilian band that existed between 2002 and 2007. Brazilian band who met a relatively big success when the hit "Você Pode Ir Na Janela", from their eponymous first album, got good airplay on radio stations around the country. The video for the song, an animation featuring the love delusions of a cat, was partly responsible for that. In 2005, they released a MTV Live DVD special, featuring all the songs from the first album, a Beatles cover ("Across The Universe"), an Ira! cover ("Dias de Luta") and a new song called "Melhor Assim". Gram's first album was heavily influenced by britpop bands like Beatles and Coldplay. Most of the songs are guitar-based, with two or three guitars but unlike many bands, there are lots of keyboards, some songs were composed in the piano ("Sonho Bom", for example), some time signature shifts ("Você Pode Ir Na Janela" has a 4/4 beat but its guitars follow a waltz-like 3/4 figure; "Quase Ilusão" doubles its tempo at the end; "Faça Alguma Coisa" is a fast 3/4 song). Some similarities between singer Sergio Filho's voice and lyrics with Los Hermanos raised some comparison between these bands (even though the sound and compositional style of the two bands are quite different). With the intention to distance themselves from this comparison, their sophomore effort, "Seu Minuto, Meu Segundo", expanded Gram's sound. The songs are less guitar-heavy and the keyboards made them a little more layered. The Beatles (in "Você Tem") and Radiohead/Coldplay ("Vivo de Novo") influences are still there, but there are more acoustic guitars ("Em Nome do Filho", the outro in "Parte de Mim") and even a New Order-ish dance-beat song (the title track). Marcello Pagotto's McCartnesque bass is more upfront in some songs ("Vale A Pena" and the title track), being the lead more than the counterpoint.