Biography

Introduction

Martin Grech (born 1982) is a Maltese-English singer, songwriter and musician from Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire.

Career

He first achieved critical acclaim after his falsetto track, "Open Heart Zoo" (written when he was 19 years old) was featured on a Lexus advert on British television in 2002. A debut album of the same name (produced by Andy Ross) quickly achieved cult status, with the record being compared, in places, to the work of The Cure, Radiohead, Nine Inch Nails and Jeff Buckley.^{[by whom?]} The accompanying UK tour saw Grech gain a larger following and further critical support.^{[citation needed]}

2005 saw the arrival of Grech's second album, Unholy. It dealt with much darker, and more disturbing themes than his debut record, including such lyrical topics as insanity, heresy and death.^{[citation needed]} As before, reviews were positive and his fan base expanded. The Unholy art work created by Stephen Kasner was hung as a backdrop to his concerts.

Grech split with Island Records shortly after the release of Unholy, but Grech's MySpace page announced the arrival of the new album, March of the Lonely. The first single from the album, "The Heritage", was released as a CD single on 30 March 2007 on Grech's own record label, 'Martin Grech Songs' via the online label, Burning Shed. March of the Lonely took a completely different approach from his previous CDs, and was much more acoustic, more guitar-based, with a thinner texture and softer atmosphere.^{[citation needed]} March of the Lonely was released on 4 June 2007 in the UK via Genepool Records.

After moving to California, Grech began working on new material under the name 'Meatsuit'. Demos on MySpace revealed a development of a heavier gothic sound, but in December 2008 Grech announced that his Meatsuit project had been terminated.

Other work

In 2003 Grech was invited to play at the Jeff Buckley tribute concert by Buckley's mother Mary Guibert, at the Garage, Highbury alongside Ed Harcourt and Jamie Cullum. In 2005, Adam White sampled "Open Heart Zoo" for his trance track "Ballerina". In 2008 Grech created the film score to the Adam Mason film, Blood River.

As well as his solo releases, Grech has performed vocals on the album First Chance I Get I'm Out Of Here (2005) by fellow Aylesbury musician, Zealey. He drummed for the four-piece rock band Ophelia Torah between early 2006 and April 2007.

Grech has also been involved in a collaboration project, organised by yourcodenameis:milo, called 'Print is Dead'. Along with Bloc Party, Graham Coxon, Tom Vek, Reuben and Biffy Clyro, he worked with yourcodenameis:milo, in their recording studio, to write a song in one day. The track was called "We Hope You Are What You Think You Are".