Behind the jazzy notes and twangy rhythms of indie pop echoing across the gym in the opening of last year’s Los Altos High School’s annual Diversity Rally are none other than four Los Altos High students and their student-run band, Kalico.

Three days a week, four Los Altos High students ranging from rising juniors to Class of 2025 alumni go to the Los Altos United Methodist Church to practice for their band. Kalico co-founder and Los Altos alum Simona Choi said that on those three evenings, school work and responsibilities are shoved aside, and it’s just creating music.

“[With Kalico] I was hoping to create an environment and a space where we could have fun and joke around with each other, and also just enjoy making music together,” Choi said.

Kalico consists of the vocalist, Choi; the drummer, junior Annabele Bock; the bassist, senior Joshua Chai; and the guitarist, senior Phineas Lunt. The group primarily plays indie pop and rock — a shared musical interest among all members, Choi said.

The band has been together since January. In those seven months, Kalico has put on several performances, from playing in Matchbox’s open mic night in Mountain View to performing for the opening of Los Altos High’s Diversity Rally. With their performances, Kalico has a goal: to make music and have fun, Bock said.

“It’s just really fun to hang out with people and make music,” Bock said.

Chai said the band considers the 2025 diversity rally performance to be the biggest performance they’ve ever done. Despite piqued nerves before the performances, all members said they were happy with the outcome.

“It [performing in the LAHS diversity rally] was really intimidating, but we did well,” Choi said. “We got a lot of compliments, and at the end of the day, we’re having fun with it [performing].”

Even with many successful performances, the band has also had its fair share of stressful performances, Chai said.

One such performance was caused by a failure with a bass, but despite the nerves and stress that came with the performance, the band still found every moment memorable.

“That [the performance] was memorable for the good and bad, but it’s a good memory to look back on now, even though it was stressful in the moment,” Chai said.

The band had a break over the summer, but has future plans to start playing for the community again, with a performance in the near future at the Shoup Park Garden house on Sept 12 at 7:30 p.m. Further, many members have expressed initiative in stepping up to leadership positions and more logistical roles, Choi said.

“Through this experience, we’ve created a group and a community that’s supporting each other in our passions,” Choi said.