He played all kinds of instruments, but mostly piano. He had a raw voice. The themes of his songs vary from philosophical (“De Steen” for example) to simple (like “Een Doodgewone Jongen”). His lyrics have the eerie feel of 1960s suburbs with misted windows, potatoes on the dinner table and hard-working parents who lost all joy in life. He also tackled serious themes like domestic abuse (“Bont & Blauw”), divorce (“Rode Wijn”), modern parenting (“Pauline”) and teenage anxiety (“De wedstrijd”), while songs like “Klein Liedje” and “1+1 = 1” contrastingly deal with the sheer joy of life and love. He started his career in music with “Neerlands Hoop in Bange Dagen”, a cabaret group consisting of Bram Vermeulen and Freek de Jonge. But when Freek went solo, Bram decided to do the same. In an interview Bram said: “Neerlands Hoop was Freek’s development, after the split my development started.” He started the group “Bram Vermeulen and the Toekomst”. Bram Vermeulen is seen as one of the first people to truly make ‘nederpop’ (Dutch pop music) after he split with Freek de Jonge. On a musical level, Dutch pop music was initially just English pop music with Dutch lyrics. Bram Vermeulen is credited as being one of the first - if not the first - to actually create pop music that accommodates for the use of Dutch lyrics. A theme running through his later work is his belief in reincarnation. After presenting a documentary on the First World War, Vermeulen became convinced that he was in fact a French lieutenant in a previous life. This resulted in the album “Oorlog aan Oorlog”. Although he had a steady following in the Netherlands, his popularity and solo success was notably bigger in Belgium. Bram died of a heart attack in his sleep on September 4th 2004 when he was in Tuscany, Italy. |
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