aaamusic | On 04, Jan 2011

The story couldn’t possibly be more fitting for the music – a married couple from Denver, Colorado decide to abandon the humdrum 9-5 workaday life, save up for a sailboat, and go sailing for 8 months along the Atlantic coastline, capturing the events in song as they go along. The resultant tracks – preternaturally perfect morsels of instantly infectious 60’s inflected pop – leak onto the internet, winning devout fans in tastemakers such as Gorilla Vs Bear, Pitchfork, NME and Guardian, and propelling the duo into the spotlight.

It may sound like the stuff of dreams but is, in actual fact, all true, having happened last year to Patrick Riley and Alaina Moore, aka Tennis. And now, with a debut album, “Cape Dory” already completed and set for release in the UK later this year, the buzz is reaching fever pitch on both sides of the pond. The single “Baltimore”, released on the perpetually ahead- of-the-curve label Young and Lost Club, will be the band’s first official release here, and for the uninitiated, is a perfect entry point into the dreamily romantic world of Tennis. With Moore’s warm, star-crossed vocals and Riley’s chiming guitars swirling around, it is without a doubt one of the sweetest and most endearing pop songs you’re likely to hear all year, and is pretty much summery escapism in a bottle – you can almost feel the rush of sun on your back and wind in your hair as you listen to it.

Excitingly enough, Tennis will also be heading over to the UK and Europe for their first ever shows this side of the ocean this month, beginning with a headline show at the Lexington this Friday, January 7. They have also added another can’t-miss show at White Heat on January 18, and are playing a string of European shows in between. We would strongly advise not to miss out on what are sure to be some truly magical shows indeed.

TRACKLISTING

1.     Baltimore

UPCOMING LIVE DATES

January

7 – Lexington, London

8 – Paradiso, Amsterdam

10 – Emporium Galorium, Rouen

11 – Les Bouffles du Nord, Paris

13 – ISC Club, Berne

14 – Ampere, Munich

15 – Bang Bang, Berlin

16 – Beatlemania, Hamburg

18 – White Heat, London

19 – Cockpit 3, Leeds

20 – Captain’s Rest, Glasgow

21 – The Deaf Institute, Manchester