REVIEW: Tennis Says their bittersweet Farewell in Austin
REVIEW
REVIEW
☆ BY SOPHIE GRAGG ☆
THERE ARE CERTAIN BANDS THAT BECOME MORE THAN JUST MUSIC TO THEIR FANS. They’re companions - soundtracking quiet mornings, road trips, breakups, makeups, and everything in between. For me, Tennis has been that band since high school. So when I found myself at Emo’s in Austin this past Wednesday, standing shoulder to shoulder with a sold-out crowd of fellow longtime fans, it was hard not to feel the weight of the moment. This wasn’t just another show. It was a goodbye.
Originally scheduled for Stubb’s, the venue change due to weather didn’t dampen the vibe one bit. If anything, the more intimate setting at Emo’s made the farewell feel even more personal. The audience, mostly late Gen Z and millennials who had clearly grown up with the band, buzzed with a gentle, nostalgic energy. Everyone knew this was the last chances to see a duo that had quietly defined an era of indie pop.
Alaina Moore and Patrick Riley took the stage with their signature cool - effortless, understated, and entirely magnetic. Alaina’s voice, as always, was commanding yet soft, floating above the warm, textured instrumentals with the kind of clarity that has made her so beloved over the years. There’s a certain glow to Tennis’ sound, something almost analog in a digital world. It’s smooth without being sterile, tender without being fragile. It was all there Wednesday night.
The setlist was a thoughtful blend: a taste of their new material from Face Down In The Garden, their seventh and final studio album, paired with older favorites that had the crowd singing every word. Songs like “Runner” and “In the Morning I'll Be Better” hit differently in this context. No longer just tracks from their catalog, but emotional landmarks in a 15-year journey that’s coming to a close.
They didn’t shy away from acknowledging the farewell, either. Alaina spoke candidly about what it means to bring this chapter to an end, describing it as bittersweet, a word that hung in the air all night. You could tell it wasn’t just the fans feeling it. The band felt it too.
Seeing Tennis live has always been a transportive experience, but this show carried extra weight. It felt like flipping through the pages of a photo album you didn’t realize you’d been building—each track pulling up moments and memories from the last decade of life. That’s the power of a band like Tennis: they’re woven into the everyday, the in-between, the growing up.
As they prepare to close out their final tour this fall, and with the release of Neutral Poetry: First Recordings, Unreleased Demos 2009–2010, there’s a sense that they’re leaving on their own terms, with grace, honesty, and a deep appreciation for the fans who’ve been with them from the start.
