Once again proving his endless versatility as an artist, rising star grentperez has released his highly anticipated EP ‘When We Were Younger’ and focus track “Stuck On You“, out now everywhere via AWAL and Fast Friends.
Along with the release of the new EP this week, grentperez announced his first-ever live performance in Asia. He is set to perform in Manila on 16 June, at Eastwood Central Plaza. The show is free for fans to attend on a first-come-first-served basis.
Conceived as a means to get out of a songwriting rut, ‘When We Were Younger’ is a seven-song collection centered around the concept of nostalgia. Motivated by a desire to stave off cynicism and embrace the carefree creativity of childhood, in his own words ‘When We Were Younger’ “is a collection of music each relating to figures of the past, whether it be in love, loss, families and friendship.”
On the focus track “Stuck On You”, grentperez’s versatility exhibits itself repeatedly, presenting a strumming shuffler that rides sparkling keys and a spotless falsetto to tell a story of memories that just won’t shake. Recalling old memories, grentperez explains “I wrote this song the first time I had been away from my friends at home for more than a month. I felt like I left just as things were getting good, so this song was a recollection of fond memories and a call to make new ones and wanted to speak about making up for the time we’d lost since I’d been gone.”
Throughout ‘When We Were Younger’, grentperez displays a director’s knack for world-building where the discrete elements throughout the tracks are as disparate as one could imagine but together everything makes sense – different musical gestures and lyrics stimulating long-dormant memories while simultaneously providing a soundtrack for new ones. Fusing the signifiers of a wide variety of nostalgic sounds: his beloved bossa nova, yes, but also sprightly Philadelphia soul, the swelling strings of golden-era Hollywood, even the soundtracks and general vibe of 90s romcoms – the bold approach hits once you press play on the EP and the opening track busts in with a psychedelic spaghetti western fanfare. “I wanted to try to create a THX-style intro to the project,” he elaborates. “Kind of recreate the childhood thrill of booting up a VHS tape.”
Inspired by his parents’ record collection that soundtracked his childhood (Dionne Warwick, The Carpenters, The Bee Gees + more), the intuitive and unexpected sonic detours throughout ‘When We Were Younger’ are what make grentperez’s breezy, lithe pop songs feel full of life. “Connecting with what I remember as a really lovely childhood grounds me in the real world and keeps me thinking of the important friends and family in my life,” grentperez explains, “it keeps me from getting ahead of myself.”
Multi-media artist, singer-songwriter and producer grentperez’s handcrafted DIY pop instantly soothes on a series of releases that have helped endear him to rapidly growing audiences at home in Australia as well as further afield in Southeast Asia, North America and Europe.
His debut single “Cherry Wine”, released in September 2021 shot up the Spotify viral charts across the globe, including the Philippines, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam, and swept up the #1 spot in Singapore soon after its release. In less than two years, grentperez’s catalogue has seen over 200 million streams to date, and over 2 million monthly listeners on Spotify, with hundreds of new fans discovering him daily.
Born in Australia, grentperez grew up as the youngest of three kids in a Filipino family. Raised on a diet of The Eagles, The Beatles, and Queen thanks to his dad before moving on to the likes of Musiq Soulchild. As soon as he received his first nylon string acoustic, he taught himself Jeremy Passion’s “Lemonade”, learning chords, shapes, and plucking patterns. At the end of 2013, he launched his YouTube channel which currently sits at over half a MILLION subscribers.