RAINER MARIA • Look Now Look Again • LP

Polyvinyl Records

Reissue of the second album 'Look Now Look Again' (1999) by the US emo band Rainer Maria. Recorded with the help of Mark Haines (Poster Children, Son Volt) and Elliot Dicks (Joan Of Arc) at Smart Studios, LNLA is the definitive Rainer Maria album, a standard by which the band will always be measured. The guitar is open-tuned and sings through a cranked-up old Fender amp, the melodic bass rolls, the drums thunder, and the lyrical interplay between Kaia and Caithlin is capable of piercing a grapefruit-sized hole in the heart. The reissue is released on Pink Stripe with Brown Splatter vinyl, matching the iconic cover.

Jenn Pelly for Pitchfork: "Released in 1999, Rainer Maria’s second and best album, Look Now Look Again, is the sound of three artists collectively undertaking the profound task of self-possession [...] one of the greatest albums of emo’s revered second wave, and it is evermore relevant as women’s vulnerability has become the center of independent rock at large."

Jeff Salamon for SPIN: "William Kuehn's catalytic drumming and Kyle Fischer's grandiose guitar take out trees left and right, while [Caithlin De Marrais's] bass skirts the shoulder. When, at album's close, she announces, 'I'll find my voice tonight,' you realize that, thanks to a 50-year old guitar-based musical tradition, she already has. Rock is good for that."

Suzy Exposito for Rolling Stone: "Most shattering are De Marrais' admissions in 'Broken Radio,' her voice quivering with fury: 'I'm certain if I drive into those trees/It'll make less of a mess/Than you've made of me.' Perhaps the dearth of women in emo speaks to a disparity in how vulnerability is perceived; where 'feelings' are historically subversive for men in punk, it's less remarkable, or just plain undesirable, in women. Look Now Look Again plays like an act of artistic justice."