March 2007 Music Reviews

Looker

Looker: Born Too Late

Band Members
Boshra AlSaadi-guitar & vox
Nicole Greco-guitar & vox
Rachel Smith-bass & vox
Robbie Overbey-drums

After my initial play of Born Too Late, the first full-length album from NYC-based Looker, I wasn't absolutely sure what I'd heard, but I darn well knew I liked it. In a music world containing no shortage of hacks and fakes, it required a considerable measure of audacity to make a record like Born Too Late. There's nothing slick or hip or calculated about Looker. They're just three girls and a guy out to have all kinds of gloriously un-self-conscious fun in the process of carving out their own uniquely blended form of rock & roll.

Looker's sound is basically a crazy-quilt mixture of Brill Building girl group harmonies and Ramones-influenced pop punk. The vocals carry the spirit of 60's girl groups, but there's also an endearingly unpolished quality to them that suggests an early punk vibe. At the same time, the band's instrumental sound is more smooth and in control than anything you'd be likely to hear from a punk band circa 1979.

It's one thing to have the idea of juxtaposing disparate musical elements. It's something else entirely to be able to execute such an idea in high style. There's a razor-thin line between enthusiasm versus parody when it comes to reinventing musical styles of the past. Looker does not stray to the wrong side of that line – there's a fair amount of joyful camp here, but it never slides into ironic self-consciousness. There's not the tiniest suggestion that the band is straining to get anywhere, even when the vocal gymnastics get really revved up. Boshra (guitar/vox), Nicole (guitar/vox), Rachel (bass/vox) and Robbie (drums) have only been together since 2003, but you'd never know it from their seamlessly blended sound.

And I'm here to tell you, those three-part harmony vocals DO get revved up! Born Too Late is filled with excellent songs, but it's the fearless performances that make the disc so extraordinary. It required a great deal of self-confidence and faith in one's own judgment and talent to create this gorgeous music that's so far out of the mainstream that it's not even visible on the far horizon. From the fuzz-tone guitar of the title song, to the way Disaster slowly builds to a stunning crescendo, to the hyper-speed vocal pyrotechnics of Tickle My Spine, Born Too Late delivers a wide assortment of aural thrills and chills. Highly recommended.

Looker Links

Looker on MySpace

Official Website

Reviewed by Mike Ramsey of The Cover Zone

Copyright © 2007 The Cover Zone