DPRAM

Inspirations: The Roots of DPRAM’s Sound

Where rhythm hums in the moss-draped oaks and every street corner vibrates with history—that’s where DPRAM draws breath. Our inspiration isn’t something we reach for, it’s the ground we stand on. It’s the call of brass bands rolling through a parade, the raw groove of a Creole banjo, the gospel cries rising out of a Sunday morning church, and the pulse of second lines that turn streets into rivers of sound.

From Congo Square, where enslaved Africans laid down the first rhythms of what would become jazz, to the neon-soaked nights of Storyville where those rhythms fused with European harmonies, the DNA of Louisiana music runs through everything we do. It’s a current that carries us forward, a mix of joy and struggle, of heritage and invention, of memory and improvisation.

Every note we play is tied to this living archive. The wail of the horn, the stomp of the drum, the shimmer of strings—they’re not just sounds, they’re stories passed down across generations. DPRAM is not trying to recreate the past, but to channel the energy of it, shaping it into something alive, urgent, and unmistakably our own.

This is more than influence. It’s inheritance. And when we play, it’s Louisiana itself you’re hearing—wild, soulful, timeless.