Lookyloos over Locksley Hall

Spring is in the air, when common lore (or at least common Lord Alfred Tennyson) says that a young man's fancy turns to thoughts of love. And I'm a little longer in the teeth than I used to be, but this Spring's fancy for me is the latest Lookyloos' album, You're Looking Very Beautiful Man, that was recently added to emusic.

The Lookyloos are a three piece band from Davis, who may be familiar to some readers because they played with the Loud Family and Anton Barbeau at the What If It Works? release party last July at the Fox & Goose in Sacramento. This is only their second album, but they've been around since the early 90s.

Their sound is indie pop that falls somewhere between New Jersey (Luna, Yo La Tengo) and New Zealand (the Chills,the Clean, the Bats). Their myspace bio also lists Pavement and Belle & Sebastian as influences. Eric Janssen sings in a Stephen Malkmussy, Ira Kaplany, Dean Warehamy timbre that's something of an acquired taste, but fits his songs really well.

And the songs themselves are all fabulous, like mini short stories.. or maybe short films. One song on You're Looking Beautiful ("Nobody Sends Black Flowers") comes from a line in Harold & Maude and another ("Double Feature") namechecks Jim Jarmusch and Harvey Keitel. If this album were a movie, it would be something that IFC might play in the middle of the day on a weekday rather than a midsummer box office blockbuster.

The Lookyloos have one earlier album, 2002's Perhaps the Most Satisfying Joy Left to Us in an Age So Limited and Vulgar as Our Own (the long album title comes from a line in Oscar Wilde's "Picture of Dorian Gray") that has a cover of the Chills' song "Doledrums". At last summer's Fox & Goose show they covered "Doledrums" and "A Picture of Dorian Gray" by the Television Personalities. Both of their albums are great Springtime listens, and may be at least one of the most satisfying joys left to us in this limited and vulgar age.