Paraluma, a 3-year-old band created by Alex Karan ‘23 and Nolan Beyer ‘23, is continuing its climb to the top. Its members play gigs in and outside of school and are also in the process of creating songs for a label, Karan said.

“Each of us have different influences and I think it is a very nice variety,” Karan said. “We really love what we do and we’re glad the LT community is so supportive of students in music. It makes it a lot easier.”

Currently, the band is working on demos to send to recording companies as well as preparing to put a label together. They plan to release this music on Spotify in order to reach a larger audience, Karan said.

“We’re not in it for the money or to be famous, but we want to be recognized,” Karan said.

Paraluma’s previous gigs have included a performance at a record store called CD Source located in Loves Park, as well as performances at LT’s Monster Bash and holiday parties in the SC Corral. Karan expressed the band’s desire to participate in the upcoming student music festival, Brownstock, as well as collaborations with another LT band, Daisy Chain.

“We’ve all got really high aspirations,” Karan said. “Everyone wants to ‘make it,’ but really [the goal is] to be able to have it be a regular part of our lives for as long as it can be.”

Recently Michael Walsh ‘25 has replaced Jake Gripp ‘23 as the band’s bassist, due to an inability on Gripp’s end to attend the weekly practices. The decision to leave was a mutual decision, without sour feelings, according to both Karan and Gripp.

“Their biggest strength right now [is] probably how much they practice,” Gripp said. “They have a very good base of what they need to start [off].”

Overall, Gripp described his time on the band as a positive one, referencing the live performance at the November Variety Show in particular.

“I’m a really big fan of performing live and that was the biggest part of it for me,” Gripp said. “We did a show during the Variety Show and that was one of the best feelings ever because I haven’t played music for anyone live besides choir concerts, so feeding off the energy of the crowd was another whole new experience.”

The band plans to perform a series of rock songs at LT’s upcoming Brownstock concert in the NC Reber Center on March 25.