Dinosaur Love: A Prehistoric Experience
A highlight into a sweet and fossilized music by Peter Kulikowski and their band
Welcome to Shooting Stars, a periodical addition where we zoom our telescopes into the voids of North of Space filled with the unexpected inhabitants of our galaxy. We will highlight the many extra-ordinary beings, pieces, and places that lightly burn around us. We hope to center this on our local people who inspire us culturally, musically, artistically, athletically, and beyond in the most unexpected ways and in places where some telescopes haven’t reached yet! If you know anyone or anything that inspires you in this way that you’d like us to dissect more, please send us their information via our instagram:
or by email: jnorthofspace@gmail.com.
This month, we have entered a corner of North of Space called Sagittarius A- a supermassive black hole in the Galactic Center of the Milky Way to highlight an amazing and elusive little North of Space meteorite. Let’s set the scene, shall we?
Phoenix, Arizona- a modern city on ancient terrain surrounded by dry, porous, red hollowed rocks, meteor remains, fossils jammed in the depths of canyons, an 11,700 year old organism inhabits tall and tiny buildings that sprawl like its ancient dust. So it’s no surprise that here, when we zoom into this fossilized city, you’d find a band that playfully embodies the ancient and modern energies ruling over this valley. That band is: Dinosaur Love. And today, in fact, is the 10 year anniversary of their album “Dinosaurs Attack!” and it is our star’s birthday- HAPPY BIRTHDAY PETER!!
Manned by Peter Kulikowski, this collective, Phoenix band has been playing the plateaus of the valley’s local music scene since 2017. Playing places like The Trunk Space, Rebel Lounge, and Valley Bar, Dinosaur Love has left its tracks all over Phoenix for the last 11 years. And we love them! We had Peter come into our North of Space lair and have a chat where we found out more about the sometimes seven people that play in their band. But it wasn’t until last year that the other players trailed along, at its start, Peter manned this project on their own as they recorded and evolved with the music. Forming through friendships and interests, Dinosaur Love was built on the idea to “build an environment where it’s just for fun [,and you] play what you feel” which reflects in the music itself (Kulikowski, Peter. 2023).
North of Space tuned into the Dinosaur Love discography on Band Camp and beyond to find a prehistoric state of nostalgia and silliness. Dinosaur Love’s first few albums are a serious space for our childhood thoughts and feelings that resemble the childlike yet nuanced lyricism and musical experimentation of artists like Daniel Johnston. One song that encapsulated this very essence the best is “Fossilized Dreams” off of their album “Extinction Stinks!.” It’s a song that starts off with a dizzy, clown-like happiness where Peter sings to us about little innocent joys we sometimes hide for reasons unknown. But you can’t help letting your eyes and heart sag in a comforting sadness as you listen through. Peter wrote this one at a time filled with loss (theirs and others), grief, suicide, love and life. This song doesn’t answer or question anything in regards to these big feelings, but it does show us how we can nurture those feelings and each other during those storms. Peter stated that “...the reason why things are funny is because they’re so absurd and tragic,” and they remind us that we can’t dismiss our childlike understanding of emotions, we have to find a balance, and that’s exactly what this song does (K, Peter 2023).
Peter also goes on to state how when we let our guards down to these things through comedic relief, we often find ourselves healing, and “...most of the time it’s all accidentally” (Kulikowski, Peter. 2023). That goes the same for their creative flow and direction as well as how they manage their band. Starting off as just a project they did themselves, slowly Peter began to acquire friends into the band just because they wanted to play and have fun. That’s something that is still their motto today.
As for the music itself, it comes from a place of pure authenticity that stems from meditative walks and a general love for “zoning out” to their instruments. When asked about their latest collections, Pangea #1: Sounds from a Lost Continent and Pangea #2: Searching for Fossilized Secrets and the creative process that transcends listeners into these lost worlds, they said “I try to zone out on a type of musical theme,” which really captures exactly what these albums do to you as Peter “...tried to paint Pangea” he said “I close my eyes and see the music, so it’s more like painting” (Kulikowski, Peter. 2023). Recorded by Peter and found on Bandcamp, this collection of mostly ambient sounds really puts you in a prehistoric mindset for the soul, and it stems from the most primordial authenticity that includes a raw creative process based solely on “spur of the moment” energy.
This energy can also be found at a Dinosaur Love show where Dinosaur Love truly blossomed before a band even came together so naturally. Recently, J and S attended a Dinosaur Love show where they opened for a few other bands at The Trunk Space. Before the show even started, Peter walks around between the crowd with dinosaur feet and a mix of colors that blend to form the performer perfectly, like they’re exactly where they are suppose to be. Peter states that “until I started the band, I never wrote down my songs, I would just do different versions every time I played them” (Kulikowski, Peter. 2023). Having been to a few shows, North of Space can vouch that this is true and amazing especially with their song “Godzilla’s Not a Dinosaur” where Peter ends the song at every live show with a different story about punching someone in the face for claiming that Godzilla is a dinosaur.
Beyond that, the fluidity and community of a Dinosaur Love show is something everyone needs to experience. Peter gets everyone in the room involved; yet, they are also able to keep the essence and authenticity of their performance at a core that seems to spread into everything in the space. You find them handing out toy dinosaurs and a box of instruments to recreate a prehistoric performance that is acoustic, involved and perfectly evolved.
And to keep evolving, Peter has lots of plans for the band this year to grow including re-recordings, traveling and Arizona tours as well as the celebration of Dinosaur Love’s anniversary today! You can find out more about these plans through their instagram @dinosaurlovephx and on Bandcamp under “Dinosaur Love,” but overall, Peter says that “The best way to support the band is to support each other.”
And with that, we want to send love and shouts outs to Peter as well as J’s friends and audio/ visual talents Alex (audio) and Terrance (photography) for their participation in North of Space’s chaotic world! Now, we bid farewell to this shooting star- until the next!