Local favorite Looksy will perform back home in Tuscaloosa for the first time since July on Friday, Sept. 20, at Egan’s. The band has recently released its EP, “Deeper Into the Woods.”
“First of all, we did all of it ourselves,” Daniel Ingram, a junior majoring in journalism and lead singer, said. “We didn’t go to a studio, or we didn’t have an engineer working behind the scenes. It was a lot more control and a lot more rewarding to have done it ourselves. I think it turned out way better doing it ourselves.”
Both bassist Kyle Posten and guitarist Rob Keating met in the first grade and are alumni of the University. Later they met drummer John Laing and Ingram at Walker County High School and discovered their love for music and playing together. Moving to Tuscaloosa was the easy part, Looksy members said, but then came trying to find a space for the band to rehearse.
“When we first started playing as a band, we played in a storage unit,” Posten said. “You know the kind you get to throw all your junk in when you’re moving? We would practice in there because none of us had anywhere where we could set up our equipment. It was weird being out there in the elements.”
Before the band was taken under the guiding wing of Callooh! Callay!, Looksy played gigs that weren’t always quite what the band was expecting.
“We got suckered into a birthday party back in our hometown,” Ingram said. “It was an old VFW that had been rented out. It was kind of like an ‘anyone can come’ party, with a mix of young kids getting drunk and old people already drunk. It was chaos, but it was interesting.”
Looksy has come a long way since the days of chaotic birthday parties, playing at Iron City and the Bottletree Café in Birmingham, but Egan’s Bar will always hold a special place in the band members’ hearts.
“Egan’s is really cool, because it’s a really small room where the band plays on the floor, and if people want to go to the bathroom, they have to walk right through the band,” Posten said. “You get really close to people when you are playing. We have a ton of friends who come out, so it’s always just a really ‘home’ feeling kind of show.”
Years of playing in bands prepared Looksy for the anxiety that comes with performing, but it doesn’t mean some members don’t occasionally get pre-show jitters.
“I typically get more nervous when a family member comes to see me that has never seen it before because I’m not really like most of my family,” Ingram said. “They’re really country, so it’s strange.”
Once they hit the stage, the sense of urgency kicks in, and Keating knows what he has to do.
“If it’s a big important show, it’s an anxious, excited feeling that makes you step up your game and play a little better,” Keating said.
Looksy is hoping to put out a full-length album by the end of the year. Looksy’s music is available on iTunes, Amazon, Spotify and at looksy.bandcamp.com.
