TENNIS at the Virgin Mobile Mod Club (722 College), Friday (October 3), 7 pm. $16.50. RT, SS, TF.
“I feel a bit like a recovering addict when I say this, but it’s been a year and a half since I’ve allowed myself to read a review of our band,” explains Alaina Moore from her tour van. “It’s not to be disrespectful of music criticism, but I literally can’t do it any more.”
Moore and her husband, Patrick Riley, make up Tennis, and each album since their 2011 debut, Cape Dory, has pushed them further and further away from their twee surf pop origins. Their newest release, Ritual In Repeat (Communion), sounds more like reimagined 80s new wave than 60s beach rock. But they didn’t change up their formula in response to critics Moore discovered that the only way to combat her crippling writer’s block was to cut herself off from outsider perceptions.
“I read everything written about us for the first two album cycles, and that ruined the experience and completely distorted my whole perception of what we were doing. It got to the point where I would write a lyric or melody and in my mind I could already see the Pitchfork review hating it,” she says.
Once Moore escaped the pressure of other people’s expectations, the creative juices started flowing again, and it quickly became clear that the new songs were going in a more eclectic direction. Three different producers helped out (Patrick Carney, Richard Swift and Jim Eno), but the diversity comes more from the songwriting than the guitar tones.
Turns out, there’s nothing like playing the same songs every night on the road for a few years to make you want to expand.
“When we first started making music, our scope and abilities were very limited. I remember thinking at one point that the surf beat was my favourite beat, and why would there be any other rhythm in any song other than that beat?” says Moore.
“But by the time we were done touring that first record, I felt like I was going to kill myself if I had to hear it again.”
benjaminb@nowtoronto.com | @benjaminboles
