Looker Down is now live on all streaming services. This song was written over 25 years ago, but was never recorded as a full band studio song until this year.
There isn’t a complicated story for this song. At least not for what it’s about. Jason wrote it for his (at the time) girlfriend. They later married and are still together today.
How it wound up in this latest batch of Bucket songs is, obviously, a longer story.
At the time it was written, the band was basically on hiatus, with the members off figuring out what to do for a living. It wasn’t intended to be performed as a full band, but Jason recorded it at a studio to make a gift CD from it.
That recording would later wind up on a demo for a sort of concept album that never came to fruition. Jason had put together ten songs with some crude digital drums and sent the CD to Ryan. Ryan wrote parts for all of them just in case they ever had the chance to record them.
Looker Down was one that stood out though, as Ryan is a huge fan of Carter Beauford, and felt this song had a really strong Dave Matthews Band vibe. So when the band started working on this latest batch of songs, this is the one Ryan wanted most to bring back from the dustbin.
The results, right down to the windchime and the Nepalese drums, really do speak for themselves.
In addition to the intricate percussion, this track benefits from a bass track that was written and performed in just a few short hours by Conor Gaffney (formerly of the band The Ruse). Conor had never heard the song before that day, but he was a fantastic collaborator and the song is better for having his input.
While the original recording from 1999 lurks about as MP3 files, this single also includes a new campfire version, recorded as a single take with just the guitar and vocals.
As with all of our recent work, these tracks have been mixed and mastered by our good friend Gordon Highland, who really brings the best out of the raw stems that we send him.