Fossils and Fantasy

  A SCIENTIFIC STUDY has recently determined the color of a dinosaur’s feathers, and Greg Sullo, the front man of Brooklyn’s Dinosaur Feathers, is animated with excitement as he shares the news.  

The feathers of the Sinosauropteryx were “redish-orange, just like Greg’s hair!” Derek Zimmerman, the keyboard player and singer, chimes in from a seat at the bar of Cake Shop before a recent show.

The bandmates joke about the importance of the recent scientific breakthrough, but Sullo’s interest in dinosaurs is not all in jest. Since childhood, the singer/guitarist has been interested in the creatures of the Mesozoic Era. At one point, he even had a dinosaur shaved into the back of his head, with the creature’s tail over one ear and its head over the other. And in 2008, he named the band Dinosaur Feathers after a trip to the Natural History Museum, where he learned that dinosaurs did, in fact, have feathers.

“We have to keep abreast of these things; we have a responsibility to the musical and the scientific community,” Zimmerman, a tall, thin ex-choir boy, jokes.

But the band’s music isn’t motivated by eras past. “Being young, graduating, figuring out your place in the world… jobs, friendships, love, exploration” are themes of the band’s music, Sullo says.

Dinosaur Feathers is a trio of down-toearth guys, Sullo, Zimmerman and Ryan Michael Kiley, the band’s bassist.Their music is as light-hearted and spirited as they are in conversation. And though two of the three live in Brooklyn (Kiley’s on the Upper East Side), they opt out of the requisite black, tight musician uniform in exchange for relaxed blue jeans and bright T-shirts.

The band casually throws around the word “tropical” while grappling with a description of its free-floating pop sound.The group’s songs are all full of noise—birds, children playing, bongos and flutes—that click naturally without overpowering the well-tuned vocals.There’s a drum machine, which provides a backdrop of eclectic beats for a sound that is sequential but not mechanical, and the trio’s voices smoothly rise and fall to notes high and long.The music gives the crowd an energetic sway, native to summer but welcome in winter.

Dinosaur Feathers releases its first album, Fantasy Memorial, this week, and it’s upbeat with songs that blur the borders of pop and rock.The band’s sound is unusual but highly user-friendly and digestible, as it has honed creativity with the drum machine and strong, smooth vocals. “I Ni Sogoma,” the first song on Fantasy Memorial, opens with a recording of birds that Sullo collected on a trip to Mali, which fade as bongo drums and vocals crescendo into a lively tune whose title means “Good Morning” in Bambara, the predominant language of Mali.

Fantasy Memorial’s title track shows off the boys’ vocal capabilities with harmonies of words and sounds that dance together with melodious spunk. Most songs on the album have the mood-lifting capabilities of a bottle of Prozac, but tracks like “Vendela Vida,” a more exotic but still outwardly tropical tune with undulating drumbeats and vocal effects, balance the happy-pop nature of most of the album.

This month, the trio is driving Kiley’s Toyota Camry from New York to Texas for South by Southwest, a ride they joke will be luxurious compared to the public transportation they take to most of their New York shows. The guys are also working on a second record and gearing up to play a Mar. 5 album release show at Webster Hall—where dinosaurs shaved into the band members’ hair might not be completely out of the question.

> Dinosaur Feathers

Mar. 5, The Studio at Webster Hall, 125 E. 11th St. (betw. 3rd & 4th Aves.), 212-353-1600; 8, $10.