Even though Carmen Gray’s professional career began in the fall 2006 with the release of their debut album, "The Portrait of Carmen Gray," the group itself has been around much longer than that. Three of its members, Lappe, JJ and Pete, have played together since the late 90'.

Although it’s next to impossible to pinpoint when things really started taking off for Carmen Gray, it’s fair to say that the year 2000 proved to be a watershed for the group. Up until then, the idea had been just to have fun with music and hang out together. However, with the inclusion of Nicklas Nyman as the lead vocalist, they were now finally ready to embark on a joint voyage towards becoming a professional act. It was also round about this time that Lappe joined forces with his brother, Tommi Tikka, in the song-writing front. Since then, this song-writing team has been solely responsible for the group´s material.