Lookbook

Thu., Feb. 18, 9 p.m., $8, with Hair Rocket, Nude Beach and SuperGoose, M Room, 15 W. Girard Ave., 215-739-5577, themanhattanroom.com.

by M.J. Fine

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Published: Feb 16, 2010

rock/pop

If we set our time machine to 1986 and dropped Minneapolis' Lookbook into a junior prom, their potential for slow-dance ubiquity would be as high as that of any number of synth-pop duos. Grant Cutler plays guitar like he gets paid per fist-pump and slathers every chord in wheezy, blippy synth. And on the surface, Maggie Morrison's exactly the kind of singer you'd expect to front such stuff, with a strong, sexy voice, and the sultry look and feel for phrasing that Prince would cream over. But a closer listen reveals something less calculated: Morrison's passion comes off more like a bruised kneecap hidden beneath indestructible corduroy than the strategically ripped denim that reveals a pristine patella. Lookbook's come-hither record title might claim they're Wild at Heart, but Morrison's lyrics are more ambivalent — more torn, more vulnerable and more cryptic — than that.

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