"The Look", written by Per Gessle and performed by Roxette, was released as a single in early 1989 from the album Look Sharp!. The song became Roxette's international "breakthrough" song, finally exposing the duo to music consumers outside of the duo's native Sweden and Europe after more than one attempt. It topped the U.S. singles chart in 1989 becoming their first U.S. #1 success and scored #7 on the UK Singles Chart. The song also topped the charts in 24 other countries.

While still unknown outside of Sweden, Roxette released their second album With the success of the first two singles from the album, they toured Sweden again. When "The Look" was about to be released in Sweden as the third single, an American exchange student named Dean Cushman returned from Sweden and urged radio station, KDWB in Minneapolis, to play "The Look". From there, "The Look" spread on cassette copies to other radio stations. With the song's radio success, EMI quickly released "The Look" Suddenly, Roxette had a #1 scoring single in the United States, and the record wasn't even released. When Look Sharp!was finally released, it was able to debut on the U.S. album charts at #50, an unusual feat at the time for a newcomer artist, and later scored #23, eventually staying in the charts for 71 weeks.

According to Gessle the first two verses lyrics were guide lyrics but were kept anyway.

"Walking like a man, hitting like a hammer"... the first two verses are guide lyrics, words just scribbled down to have something to sing. Couldn't come up with anything better, so we kept them. Everybody gets lucky sometimes...

Per Gessle

All formats were released on 12 January 1989, (by EMI/Parlophone; 1363337). Also released on many formats, including 3" CD, 5" CD, and 12" vinyl. Included on most of those was The Look (Head-Drum Mix). The first edition of the vinyls was in red vinyl. A few exist in clear vinyl.

"The Look '95" is a remixed version of Roxette's hit song and it was only released commercially in the UK in connection with the release of their greatest hits album Don't Bore Us, Get to the Chorus! - Roxette's Greatest Hits.

This version of the song does not appear on the album, but two of the versions from this single were eventually included on the European release of the single "She Doesn't Live Here Anymore".

In 2009, "The Look" was used in a trailer and TV commercial for the game Grand Theft Auto: Episodes From Liberty City. Also it can heard on ingame radio station Vice City FM.