TRAMHAUS

(FR)

TRAMHAUS est un groupe de rock innovant originaire de la super créative et bouillonnante ville de Rotterdam. En seulement quelques années Tramhaus à fait connaitre son nom bien au-delà des limites de leur ville d'origine. La musique de Tramhaus peut se ressentir comme la bande originale d'une histoire vive, mystérieuse et dangereuse. La force du groupe c'est que celui-ci vous embarque dans une course riche en émotions à l'écoute de ses morceaux avec une franche camaraderie qui se ressent plus que tout sur scène.

Le deuxième album du groupe ' Blister " va sortir le 9 octobre en France chez Vicious Circle et le groupe le défendra en salle et festivals un peu partout dans le monde.

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(EN)
“The hours of folly are measured by the clock; but of wisdom, no clock can measure.”
William Blake’s line from the ‘Proverbs of Hell’ in Songs of Experience can be seen as a
warning: to take stock of ourselves, and our ambitions. It’s a warning that brings Tramhaus
to mind. The release of their second long player, Blister, sees the Rotterdam five-piece
assimilating the experiences of their rapid ascent in a manner of which Blake may approve.

Blake posits his proverbs as teachings of the devil; those chasing the latest fix will get
burned. The trials of the clock-bound, and often enervating life on the road do make
themselves felt throughout Blister; it is mirrored in the metronomic beat that underscores and
sees out the querulous track, ‘Lap Dog’. The relentless press of time and others’
expectations is also heard in the track’s lyrics, where totemic singer Lukas Jansen states,
“For the longest time, I followed hearts” concluding a line or two later, “I’ll just agree on
everything, to get along.”

But Tramhaus are a band who have an ability to soak up what life brings and find a way
collectively - and bodily - to deal with it. Their gang mentality, and core belief that a network
of “glocal” friendships patiently built up over the last five years will see them right, has meant
they have been able to navigate a near-constant touring schedule and create a record that
exceeds the promise of their debut, The First Exit (2024).

A sense of communal, embodied, patience: through experiences of queues, denials of entry,
soundchecks, lonely hotel rooms and international dealings - good and bad - seeps through
the new record. The debut was a rush of emotions; an exciting soundtrack for one
emergency after another. But still one that drew on a less expansive worldview than Blister.

Tramhaus are not a band that writes on the road. Whilst touring it can often be too stressful
to capture effectively what needs to be recorded. Ideas do pop up while fidgeting around
during soundchecks, or whilst watching what must now be a veritable cricket score of other
artists. But songs are never fully finished when the band hits the studio: adjustments are
made up until the last moment, sweated out until the music starts to flow. As guitarist Micha
Zaat says of the creative process, “It's a living thing.”

This new long player was recorded at GAM Studio, in the Ardennes forest in Wallonian
Belgium, again with Floyd Atema at the desk as studio engineer and producer. GAM Studio
is off the beaten track, and the band took advantage of their time there, and indulged
themselves with long walks through the forest and kickabouts in the backyard. The band “felt
outside of the normal world.”

Powerful, loud, and assertive, Blister grows with repeated listening. And a satisfying
assurance: the record has a sleekness, and a tangible sense of space, and power. This
comes in part from a glossier production that picks up on the many nuances in the midrange.
Micha Zaat: “The studio gave us the possibility to experiment with some high-end
equipment, which would suit the new record, as we were looking for a more layered sound.”
The proactive Atema pushed the band, “cracking down hard” to get a minor detail down that
had escaped a band dizzy with repeated takes. Adema is “Truly the sixth artist in Tramhaus.”

On to the tracks. The dizzying nature of constant travel these past eighteen months is
reflected in the title of impatient opener ‘Plovdiv’ (a place they’ve played, incidentally). The
glam stomp and bouncing bassline engineered by drummer Jim Luijten and bassist Julia
Vroegh propel a number of menacing guitar riffs which in turn underpin yet more lines -
whether screamed or soliloquised - about “swallowed” time, or declamations like, “Trust is
the guide, blindly I’ll follow”.

Quoting lyrics about being confused by time may sound odd when claiming Tramhaus,
refreshed by their sylvan odyssey, have developed a palpable sense of time and space in
their music. But this ability to balance out and expand their sound, really is for all to hear on
this new record: it is a key point. On ‘Cluster’, for instance, the clang of one guitar acts
beautifully against the processed whine of the other. A mix of atonal and melodic elements:
an alchemical process that gives room for the song to operate (and something that may not
have been fully expressed on their first long player). The track following ‘Cluster’, ‘The
Answer?’ - a song of flight, and refuge - plays off an almost twangy, country-style riff against
splenetic crashes of rhythm and a driving bass-guitar; the drama is heightened because
these elements are exploited. Zaat's fast-paced chord strumming is interrupted by van
Osnabrugge’s staccato riffs, creating tension and a feeling of uneasiness.

The twin guitar attack built up by Micha Zaat and Nadya van Osnabrugge is akin to a dance,
where one player responds, almost physically, to the other’s move. This symbiosis comes

naturally, apparently, with no prior plans for who takes up a particular role in a song. Both are
quite different guitarists in style and with different backgrounds. Nonetheless, both lean into
experiment, sound-wise as well as in arrangements. The imagination plays a central role in
their playing. Asked about ‘Cluster’, Zaat feels as if his part is akin to “plowing through thick
dirt while Nadya floats on top like a fairy, making the piece as a whole one of Sisyphean
nature; a role play between never ending despair and hope.”

The slower tracks on the record sometimes reveal a “rockist” grandeur that they only hinted
at before: Pixies or late-period Nirvana maybe, (even, gasp), or a low whisper of Nick Cave
and the Bad Seeds somewhere else. Maybe. ‘Overachiever, Big Believer’ and ‘Sly (Like
Ever)’ have caustic, growly natures and patiently mapped out melody lines, both of which
would have fitted in very nicely indeed back in 1991. Elsewhere, ‘Solace’, with its open chord
strum, has a swagger that could have been plucked from a Saints or a Bad Seeds track.
Jansen’s dreamy, ever so lackadaisical delivery adds a layer of honeyed smooch on top.

After the introspection of the short soundpiece ‘Recoil’, we return to the sound Tramhaus
have been destroying venues with recently; ‘Rat Race’ is an uptempo charge through a set
of short and sharp, if oblique observations. Yet again, the guitar sounds are leavened out for
maximum effect: first tempered into cold steel before a fevered pay off in the thrust of the
chorus. The track’s abrupt ending only adds to its power. They are certainly a band with the
knack for deploying a canny riff to full effect. ‘I Was Never Alone’ is a speeded-up garage
number that draws, in spirit if not in form, on the cavalier spirit of The Standells or The Litter:
listen out for the low-slung bass line from Vroegh and a fluster of hi hats from Luijten - and a
riff that starts to howl like a chained-up dog.

Best is saved to last with ‘Swarm’, where, after a monolithic early Pere Ubu bass rumble, a
glorious Sabbath-like riff crashes over the listener. The dryly executed refrain has old
codgers like me in mind of Pixies in their space travel years. It’s an anthemic and
transcendent number that, in the old days would have been a surefire number one single,
one that would have encouraged teens the world over to practise their air guitar chops in
front of mum’s bedroom mirror. I wish it was double the length. To clumsily adopt another line
from Blake, Tramhaus, play that song again.

Label

Subroutine Records

Territory

France Suisse

NATIONALITY

NLD

Agent

Yves Tattevin

VIDEOS

AUDIO

<a href="https://tramhaus.bandcamp.com/track/beech">Beech de Tramhaus</a>

NEXT.SHOWS

soon

25 June 2026 La Cave Argenteuil, France

Ticket

soon

26 June 2026 Festival En Nord Beat Bailleul, France

Ticket

27 June 2026 Festival un singe en été Mayenne, France

Ticket

soon

05 November 2026 l'Hydrophone(festival les Indisciplinées) Lorient, France

Ticket

soon

Persona Grata.

TRAMHAUS

Label

Territory

NATIONALITY

Agent

VIDEOS

AUDIO

NEXT.SHOWS