TAS In Sesson: Tennis

Tennis, the married duo of Patrick Riley and Alaina Moore and drummer James Barone, released their handsome debut Cape Dory, earlier this year, a collection of breezy, yare tunes inspired by the couple's eight-month sailing trip along the North Atlantic coastline. The trio, who play Barcelona's Primavera Sound festival on May 27 and Lollapalooza in August, is already working on a follow-up album, due out in 2012 and likely devoid of sailboat imagery.

During a recent visit to New York, Riley, Moore and Barone dropped by Studio A for a chat and played several songs from Cape Dory, including "Marathon," inspired by a harrowing experience at sea:

Alisa Ali: The big story behind the album, Cape Dory, is that it was inspired by an eight-month sailing trip that you guys took along the North Atlantic coastline. The name of your boat is the name of the album, right?

Alaina Moore: It’s actually the type of boat, Cape Dory. We don’t make known the actual name of our boat because we didn’t name it and we’re not that proud of it or attached. Our boat is really named Swift Ranger and it’s not fast at all and it’s hardly a ranger, so we would refer to it as The Cape Dory instead.

Alisa: Did you take a bunch of sailing courses to get prepared?

Patrick Riley: Not really. Sailing courses in respect that we bought books and taught ourselves how to do it, so I think between quizzing each other every day for about two years on the terminology and points of sail and what to do in certain situations, we were able to make it work.

Alisa: So once you were on the water, you found out that there were situations that you were not prepared for?

Alaina: Absolutely. That’s part of the appeal of sailing; the unknown. The surprises, although those are sometimes hard to handle. Those make for the best stories, I think.

Alisa: Anything really fun has to have a little element of danger.

Patrick: Totally. Gives a context.

Alisa: When did you take this sailing trip?

Patrick: We saved up for six years prior. We physically did it from January 2009 to August 2009. It’s definitely a long term goal and I don’t think there’s any other way to treat such an adventure because it certainly needs a lot of preparation and obviously finance.

Alisa: It’s funny that you saved for six years but only crammed in sailing for eight months.

Alaina: We didn’t realize how much more it would cost to really live on your boat and turn your boat into a home and have it be safe. We underestimated that.

Alisa: It was a pretty huge thing that you did in your life and made an impact, influencing the making of this record. You probably get asked about this specific period in your life so often.

Alaina: Fortunately, it’s the only experience we want to relive over and over so we don’t mind having it recalled constantly in conversation. It is funny to us that no one asked us questions about it until after we made the album, Cape Dory. Then people wanted to know about our sailing trip. But until then, even our own friends didn’t care that much. It’s too much outside of their paradigm. It seems too antiquated or out of a book to live on the water and go back to that existence.

Alisa: Did you have a couple of go-to stories that you related to your friends and family?   

Alaina: Yes, those are the ones that made their way into songs on the album, like our song “Marathon.” We had to sail to Marathon, Florida to make our way around from the West coast to the East coast of Florida. In order to do it we had to make our first overnight sail, our first stretch that was too far to go in daylight. We were so scared to be at sea all night long. We were so new and we did all the research we could, but you never know what it’s going to be like until you’re out there. I was so scared I couldn’t eat. When we were leaving the anchorage, we ran aground in a falling tide and we had to dig ourselves out with anchors and our rowboat. It’s called kedging off, to drag our boat out. It was a horrible start, full of mishaps. But we came hobbling in the next day to the island and I wrote everything down, from beginning to end. That’s now the song “Marathon.”

[video:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NCBmknH1usU&feature=channel_video_title]

Alisa: You guys spent almost a year almost exclusively in each other’s company on a boat. Now you’re a husband and wife team that works together. That’s a lot of time for two people to spend together. Does that ever put a strain on your relationship?

Alaina: I think it’s weird transitioning from the mode of whatever the endeavor that we’re doing together. In that setting we’re more like friends or companions. When that’s done, we go back to being in a relationship.

Patrick: That’s a good way of putting it.

Alaina: I feel we can easily separate. We’re colleagues and very close friends when we do Tennis or when we’re sailing. We get stuff down and then we go back to being in a relationship afterwards. Patrick: Our relationship started with just being friends so it’s easy to go back to that.

Alisa: A lot of times I feel when people spend a lot of time together, that I feel their personalities and identities combine and meld.

Alaina: In a lot of ways we’ve become very similar but at the same time, touring also emphasizes your differences profoundly. When you disagree, there’s no escaping it. You’re in a car or a boat and you have to work it out. I think it’s a really good thing for anyone to do. It forces you to be more confrontational.

Alisa: I can’t see you being that confrontational!

Patrick: We don’t get that heated. I don’t care about much, to be honest.

Alaina: You don’t care about fighting that much.

Alisa: That’s a good recipe for a relationship if you don’t care about fighting.

Alaina: Yeah, it’s easier for me to win that way.

Alisa: In collaborating and writing, do you, Patrick, come up with a verse and then Alaina?

Patrick: It started out far different from where it is now. We had all of these ideas that we wanted to put down. I first started just tracking in all of the music on a four-track and then Alaina would have one little track left on the four track and try to plug in the vocal part, but we had to be completely isolated from one another. We couldn’t do it together. It was too hard. We didn’t understand our writing, so it was completely separate. It was the only time we were ever able to do it as a joint effort and I think, now, all of our songs are written together.

Alisa: Can you describe each other’s writing style?

Alaina: Patrick just writes in his own way. Not textbook at all. I can’t even explain it; things just appear in his head and he goes with it. I’m so much more formulaic about it which is how our songs end up sounding more pop in structure, but that’s Patrick writing and me trying to structure things.

Patrick: Alaina studied analytic philosophy and I studied continental philosophy and those two don’t get along.

Alisa: What about the music? You both have a background in it?

Patrick: We were both music majors at one point. I think we did it for about a year each and we both dropped out and ended up graduating with philosophy degrees.

Alisa: What did you play?

Alaina: I played piano.

Patrick: And guitar. I tried to do that whole vocal thing that was awful (laughs). I have a terrible voice and sight singing is the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life.

Alaina: I tried to encourage him because everyone can sing. You just have to practice, but he doesn’t like to practice.

[video:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jnnYHhzAngU]

Alisa: I saw the video to “Pigeon” which was very enjoyable. It features a magician doing a bunch of different tricks.

Alaina: In a poorly lit room. Alisa: Where did that concept come from? Are you fans of sorcery and magicians?

Alaina: Not at all. We have a really good friend and we love his sense of humor. We, in general, don’t like music videos. I think they always do an inadequate job of representing the songs, so we like to approach ours more light-hearted and we gave the song to our friend and said, do whatever you want.

Patrick: It started from an inside joke about making a music video that’s focused on cheesy magic. So it was.

Alisa: I also enjoy the cover to your record, Cape Dory, which I think is an homage to Lisa Hartman?

Alaina: It is. You know the record “Hold On?” It’s pretty much the same pose.

Alisa: Were you a fan of “Bewitched?” She was on “Bewitched,” right?

Alaina: I didn’t even know that, actually. No, I’m more a fan of campy album art. I collect it. That wasn’t destined to be the album art initially. It mistakenly became the album art.

Patrick: We were really torn. I really wanted it to be the album art, but a lot of people were deciding otherwise.

Alaina: We had a split camp of people. Then it ended up leaking on the internet and people assumed it was our album art and it was announced so many places that we decided to go with it.

Alisa: You look at this album art and I’m expecting, looking at this cover ….

Alaina: You’re expecting Amy Grant.

Patrick: But see, if we put a sail on it, we’d just be beating a dead horse. Sailing-themed album, sailing-themed art. I don’t even want to listen to this.

Alaina: Pat wanted some surprises.

Alisa: You do have pictures of the boat on the inside of this.

Patrick: That was the compromise.

Alisa: You didn’t even consider making music as a living until you started getting interest from music labels. Is that right?

Patrick: Yes. It started in our bedroom and honestly it was a personal construction. For us it was all of our nostalgia for sailing just funnelled into [our music]. As Alaina says, it could have been painting because we used to paint together as well, but we decided to do music instead. We literally had no incentive or motivation to even pursue music as a career. I’d just gotten a really nice job at this museum in Colorado and I was really happy. I was working there for a year doing installation and physical operations, but all of the sudden the internet took our songs and some labels were interested. We were like, what are we going to do with our lives now?

Alaina: I was working retail for a locally-owned clothing store in Denver owned by a woman I love and I got to do arts and crafts all day. I hated quitting actually and I plan on going back to work there as soon as our touring stops.

Patrick: But don’t get us wrong. We really like doing this.

Alisa: You have plans for another album?

Patrick: Yes. They’re small plans at this moment but we’re trying to get the ball rolling.

Alaina: We have the idea of a plan.

Alisa: Will you have to take another big trip somewhere to get inspired? Or has it been an inspiring period while traveling?

Patrick: For a long time we thought that we’d only be able to write after going on sailing trips because it’s the only place where we could find inspiration and creativity. I think we have enough material now, just from touring the States five times.

Alaina: I think we realized that we’re just creative people who can write music. It’s not something we knew about ourselves; this just happened to be the catalyst to help us discover that. Now that we know that, I think we feel comfortable just writing music anytime. We don’t need to do anything as grandiose as eight months on a sailboat. Alisa: Do you miss home?

Alaina: Kind of. But it doesn’t really even feel like home now. Home feels like Patrick and James now. And the van.

[video:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ETJtEGbQev8&feature=channel_video_title]