Take 5: The story behind the sound

Green Line Records, Northeastern’s student-​​run record label, pre­sides over the musical enter­prise of 10 col­lege acts, helping them record albums, sell mer­chan­dise, and book shows.

The majority of the bands operate out of Boston, studying at schools like North­eastern and per­forming at local clubs like TT the Bears.

They vary in tone and tenor, ranging from cabaret pop and sludge punk to art rock and post hard­core. Some of them dream of hit­ting it big, playing sold out shows at venues like Madison Square Garden, while others jam for the pure joy of making tunes and exer­cising their cre­ative muscle.

With that in mind, here’s the story behind the sound of five Green Line bands.

Best Dressed

This North­eastern quartet recently per­formed at TT the Bears and released a four-​​track EP called “Puz­zles.” The band draws sonic inspi­ra­tion from glam rockers of decades past— David Bowie, Iggy Pop, and Brian Eno among them—but does not shy away from testing the bound­aries of its musical acumen.

“I don’t think we’ve ever had a musical idea and thought, ‘We’re not sup­posed to do this,’” says gui­tarist and vocalist Charles Per­rone, CIS’17. “Any­thing is on the table and we’re willing to draw from it.”

Dinoczar

This North­eastern trio formed in the fall of 2013 and started recording new mate­rial shortly there­after, releasing an eight-​​track EP called “Bloody Bobcat” in the summer of 2014. Bands like Black Sab­bath and The Stooges have inspired their sound, which gui­tarist Paul Dunne describes as a con­glom­er­a­tion of “fuzz, sludge, cream, and garage rock.” Dinoczar played six shows in November alone and plans to keep on rocking in 2015. Says Dunne, S’16: “Our goal is to con­tinue playing base­ment shows with other great bands.”

Grace and the Carnivore

This sib­ling band formed in 2006 and picked up momentum in 2009, when Grace, John, and Robert Carney started busking on the streets of Province­town, Mass­a­chu­setts, and writing “showy” songs based on their new­found friend­ships with the city’s drag queens. Since then, the chamber pop trio has per­formed along­side the Boston Pops; released an EP titled “Out of Con­text;” and started gig­ging in Boston clubs. They pull ideas from singer-​​songwriters like Fiona Apple and write orig­inal tunes in their free time. “It’s ther­a­peutic to put them together,” says pianist John Carney, AMD’15. “We read each other well, and we hope that famil­iarity trans­lates into the music.”

Grey Season

This five-​​piece folk-​​rock band from Berklee Col­lege of Music formed in 2011 and recorded its debut LP in 2014. Over the past year, the quintet has played more than 80 shows throughout New Eng­land, including a monthly per­for­mance at the Middle East. Jon Bergamo, AMD’17, man­ages the group, whose mem­bers often call him the “sixth member of the band.” He says that Grey Season’s sound is inspired by the syn­ergy of its indi­vidual mem­bers, who count The Bea­tles and The Rolling Stones among their favorite bands, and notes that its pro­fes­sional aspi­ra­tions are pretty high. A few weeks ago, he says, the band mem­bers were walking past Madison Square Garden when the bassist remarked, semi­se­ri­ously, “In a few years, we’ll be here.”

Karmon Voh

This North­eastern duo, whose mem­bers prefer to be referred to as Kármán and Voh, released their debut EP in March and are cur­rently working on a full-​​length LP. The exper­i­mental art/​dance col­lec­tive grav­i­tates toward a range of musical acts, run­ning from My Bloody Valen­tine, the shoegazing Irish band, to Faust, the German krautrockers.

“I started playing guitar some time ago, but I renounced formal music training and began messing around with a lot of crazy tun­ings and playing styles,” says Kármán, the group’s vocalist and pro­ducer. His writing style is pri­marily influ­enced by his per­cep­tual expe­ri­ences, he says, noting that “I like to expe­ri­ence my sur­round­ings tex­tu­ally, in the sense that every­thing is open to interpretation.”