10/02/2010 Jazzwise Magazine

(Human Equivalent) a Scottish band made up of former Berklee students and young award winning Scottish jazz musicians is fronted by a saxophonist-composer barely out of her teens. This makes the level of musicianship on this CD all the more astonishing. Style-wise it's largely jazz-rock fusion given a vigorous makeover. Because it's a sub-genre of jazz in which a very high level of notes and musicianship is essential it's no surprise it has its devotees in the rehearsal corridors of Berklee - for evidence listen to Hiromi's band. Yet, Gough-Cooper's lyrical alto sax seems also to have absorbed M-Base-type odd metered cryptic patterns and some of the impressive drummer's bustling grooves certainly demonstrate a line through to drum and bass and hip hop. Nevertheless Future Pop - not sure what that's meant to say about it - inherits more directly from the world of Return to Forever, the keyboard impressionism of Weather Report, with some 1980s Marcus Miller-style funk thrown in. It's hardly the most original of causes, but the band manages to attain a high quality of musicianship without sacrificing any of their youthful high spirits. - Selwyn Harris.

26/08/2008 Rob Adams - The Herald

Barely a week passes, it seems, without yet another teenage Scottish jazz musician being mentioned in dispatches, usually from a session in Edinburgh’s Jazz Bar, for having swinging and improvising credentials beyond his or her years. And if this concert is any guide, that happy situation looks set to continue....

Saxophonist Leah Gough-Cooper, from Dumfries, has already moved on from youth level to study at Berklee, where she’s developing not just her own lithe alto style but a fine line in idiosyncratic compositions, too.... the stylishly grooving Future Pop effected an almost uniform raising of audience eyebrows.

27/06/2007 Kenny Mathieson

"....the most creative and adventurous player...." The Scotsman

27/06/2007 Rob Adams

"A tremendous prospect...." The Herald