Tennis – Small sound EP (Communion)

Glorious combination of pitch-perfect arrangements and swoonsome vocals, with just enough bite to keep you on the edge of your seat, from husband and wife duo Patrick Riley and Alaina Miller.

You need go no further than lead track ‘Mean steets’, unrolling on an exquisitely languid groove in keeping with the subject matter ("summer up in the Catskills baby, singing just for the thrill"). If the electric piano and beautifully slurred vocal delivery aren’t enough for you, check the drop-dead bridge – a gorgeous fog of organ stabs and the most appealingly sunny, chiming guitar line in years.

It all makes for blue-eyed soul of the highest order, brimming with pent-up emotion. Coming a close second is ‘Dimming light’, making like a slowed-down, drowsy Supremes off-cut, with a distinctly ambiguous heart beating amongst the jangly guitars and ringing piano.

To die for.



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