Tennis – ‘Face Down In The Garden’ album review: twinkling memories
THE SKINNY: Sometimes, being a music journalist just comes down to making up words. You are often left with no choice. The task to try and describe not only sound but energy, atmosphere, and emotion is one that language limitations often hinder. In the case of Tennis’ seventh album, Face Down In The Garden, I’m struggling for words to capture the vibe, so I’ll throw some hazy ones at you and hope you understand what I mean when I say, ‘Twinkling’.
While biographical details aren’t everything, the fact that Tennis – made up of Alaina Moore and Patrick Riley – are a married duo feels important. On this new album, as on many of their others, feelings aren’t overexplained. Images and scenes float in and out, clearly holding deep meaning to them, but with the couple feeling no need to break it down. You’ll get it anyway, they know you will, partly because their music fits so tightly to whatever feeling it is they’re dealing with, that it all ends up making sense.
Maybe that comes down to their love, too. Tennis is their shared language and with that mother-tongue of their long-term connection, they seem to find a way past those limitations I too face.
Face Down In The Garden is really all about that. It was born from a period of total carnage: disastrous boat trips, heavy conversations, breakdowns on tour, and illnesses. It came out of one of those moments in time where it feels like, at every turn, life is out to get you, and so living begins to feel like an odd dream. When you look back on patches like that, the dreaminess remains. You never remember everything, only floating and flashing scenes. Each song here becomes one of them.
I said ‘twinkling’ at the start because it’s the only word that feels apt. Not only do these tracks twinkle musically with so much light and shade to the instrumentals, but the energy of each glimmer with a kind of emotional nostalgia. It’s like the band has packaged up memories and is selling them back to us as the movie-montage moments after turning them all cinematic.
All told through their distinctive sonic identity, if you like that, you’ll love this. If not, maybe you’ll miss the shine.
For fans of: Trying to see your life as a gorgeous cinematic montage sequence.
A concluding comment from the back of my brain: ‘What do you want to reflect on today? Friendship, breakups or that disastrous holiday a few years back?’
Face Down In The Garden track by track:
Release date: 25th April 2025 | Producer: Patrick Riley and Alaina Moore | Label: Mutually Detrimental
‘At The Apartment’: A twinkling introduction that begins feeling like a memory and ends feeling like a movie montage. [4/5]
‘Weight Of Desire’: As the first track unveiled from this era, ‘Weight Of Desire’ sounded gorgeous then and still sounds gorgeous now. [4/5]
‘At The Wedding’: In the bio for this release, singer Alaina Moore says she traces her life through a series of moments, including things like important yet throwaway conversations at someone’s wedding. That’s captured perfectly here as Tennis have this skill for making their music sound like a scene playing on repeat in your head. [4/5]
‘Always The Same’: When I listen to Tennis, I get existential about whether love has a sound as the husband-wife duo have such a distinctive style and energy to their collaboration – is that just the sound of their connection? [3.5/5]
‘Sister’: Moore sounds incredible here as her vocals come forward in the mix and are sung out stronger for a moment. Lyrically, too, this is a beautiful moment musing on unconditional love. [3.5/5]
‘Through The Mirror’: An instrumental best moment on the record. As the whole album was inspired in part by a disastrous boat trip, there’s a woozy, coastal energy here that makes you feel like you’re floating in a strange liminal space. [4/5]
‘I Can Only Describe You’: This track loses me slightly. Still lush in the way everything the band does is, but I start to get a little itchy for something different. [3/5]
‘Blown Tires’: Breaking down is a tour rite of passage, right? Reflecting on the disaster that their last experience on the road seemed determined to be, ‘Blown Tires’ is the sharpest explanation for the angst and oddness that inspired the album. [3.5/5]
‘In Love (Release The Doves)’: A pretty outro for a pretty album. [N/A]
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