Meg and Dia Frampton belong to a new class of rockers for whom keyboards are more QWERTY than ivory.

These tech-savvy sisters from Utah, who front the five-piece indie pop band Meg & Dia, embody the kind of youthful, pioneer spirit that has come to define the post-Internet music industry. In the span of just a few years, Meg, 23, and Dia, 20, have built a dedicated international fan base primarily on the strength of their MySpace page.

"For us, it happened so fast," Meg said in a recent telephone interview from her home in Bradenton, Fla.

"Dia and I didn't have any awareness of the journey bands usually go through. We weren't the kinds of musicians to say, 'Oh, well, we're going to start playing these gigs in clubs, and then we're going to move on to bigger arenas and then we're gonna get a bus.' You know, we didn't really know any of that. We just kind of played music for fun in our band, and then everything kind of happened."

Fame, their way
Everything didn't just happen. The girls had been making music together since they were kids, which, granted, isn't all that long ago. Meg, the consummate musician, wrote songs, played guitar and sang harmony alongside Dia, the natural performer. They clearly had talent.

But thousands of talented bands toil and inevitably fail in obscurity for lack of exposure, or at least they used to. Nowadays, getting noticed is more about sound cards than sound checks. Rather than tour to build a following, today's new artists build a Web site and a fan base before they ever tour.

Meg & Dia kicks off its first headlining tour this week, backed by Warner Bros. Records. The band rolls into downtown Lancaster on Monday, Aug. 18, to play the Chameleon Club.

By any measure, success came rapidly for the Framptons, who put up a MySpace page back when they were primarily an acoustic duo.

They worked ground-up, answering all the e-mails and linking to other artists' sites. With more than 100 million people logging on to the social networking site, the girls were bound to get a few hits.

In fact, they got millions. In addition to being young and cute — a plus in any context — the Framptons possess a keen sense of harmony, and their voices blend seamlessly.

"That's one of the things that made us a little more unique in the beginning," Meg said.

"Vocal harmony is one of the things that makes a song for me."

As a female-fronted sister act, Meg & Dia draws quick comparisons to bands like Eisley and Tegan & Sara.

The Framptons decided early on to broaden their sound, adding drummer Nick Price, bass player Jonathan Snyder and guitarist Carlo Gimenez. The girls discovered Gimenez, the most senior member of the band at 25, on YouTube.

In 2006, Meg & Dia was chosen as the official MySpace band of the popular alternative-rock megafestival known as the Warped Tour.

That summer, the band released its debut album, "Something Real," on the Doghouse Records label. A track from the album, "Roses," was included on the "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" soundtrack.

By the time Warner Bros. got around to signing the band last year, Meg & Dia had already cultivated a following by making music more or less on its own terms. So when Warner moved the band into the studio this spring to record songs for a new album, the smart play was to hand over the reins to the band. Meg said she was given complete creative control..000

With great power comes great responsibility, and Meg, who had always been the songwriting force behind the band, recalled a particularly frantic moment in a Los Angeles hotel room.

"I was getting a lot of major-label pressure for the first time, and I hadn't been home in months and months and months, and there came this time, this period where I just broke down and freaked out."

Mixed feelings
Meg, of course, turned to her sister for support. Dia, whose primary responsibility to that point had been fronting the band, stepped up with lyrics and melodies.

With Dia putting out some of the initial creative energy, Meg was able to concentrate on interpreting the songs and crafting instrumentation.

The resulting album, "Here, Here and Here," is due out early next year.

Meg & Dia will introduce material from the album during their summer tour.

Meg has mixed feelings about the band's role as a headliner.

"I still don't feel like we're even close to having a substantial amount of people know who we are," she said.

"We've always opened for these huge acts. The kids didn't come to see us, so there was really no pressure. You know, I do my little opening jig, then the kids have their good time. There's going to be added pressure.

"It will be really interesting to see the kids that come and the numbers, because it's for us. The kids are coming to see us."

If it's numbers Meg's worried about, she might consider this one: 2 million. That's how many times people have visited the band's MySpace page. Or 5 million.

That's how many times people have listened to songs on the site.

Though the band concentrates more on live music these days, Meg & Dia still maintains a significant online presence, with sites at www.meganddia.com, www.myspace.com/megdia and www.purevolume.com/megdia. Gadget-enabled cool kids can even text MEGDIA to 50505 to get the latest band updates sent straight to their cell phones.

And to think they used to paste up concert posters on telephone poles.

Meg & Dia will perform Monday, Aug. 18, with Jonezetta, Dropping Daylight, the Recovery and Captain of Compliments at the Chameleon Club, 223 N. Water St., in downtown Lancaster. Doors for the all-ages show open at 6 p.m. For more information, call 393-7133.

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Michael Long welcomes e-mail at mlong@lnpnews.com.