Austin, TX

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​Sadness experts bringing you posi vibes when possible.

Tyler Jordan of Good Looks grew up in a South Texas coastal town dominated by the petrochemical industry, his childhood steeped in the tension between nature and industry, exploitation abundantly present and the wealth gap in eyeshot if you just crossed the street. His father’s church, described by Tyler as “cult-like in its intensity,” was homebase and where he learned to sing. He snuck in harmonies where there was room, and where there wasn’t, and internalized melodies and structures. He bought into the content until he looked elsewhere and discovered a new obsession of studying lyrics for detail and intention.

Bummer Year is a record about learning to take care of yourself and tending to relationships that nourish you while wrestling the weak ones away. The songs reflect on what it is to gut your way through your twenties, learning when to apologize and when you’ve got to live with what you said, because you meant it. Unapologetically, this is a guitar record, but the room you’re sitting in is always the song. Sometimes a window slams shut and a shard of restlessness escapes. At heart it’s a folk record with genuine Texas twang, built out with the engine of a rock band churning hot, willing to be delicate. The lyrics are nuanced and layered, political and playful. It’s a vulnerable album that earnestly and unabashedly reaches for your attention, then offers up a relationship.

Good Looks is a bar band searching for common ground and yearning for a better system.