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Tennyson
Tennyson performing at The Fonda Theatre, Hollywood, 2014
Background information
Origin	Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
Genres	Electronica, Nu-jazz, pop
Years active	2012–present
Labels	Counter Records, Owsla, Secret Songs
Members	Luke Pretty Tess Pretty
Website	https://tennyson.rocks

Tennyson are a Canadian musical duo consisting of siblings Luke and Tess Pretty formed in 2012.

Origins

Tennyson was formed by Luke and Tess Pretty in 2012. The pair began busking in Edmonton between ages 7 and 9, covering songs by bands such as The Beatles, Coldplay, and Weezer.

Both Tess and Luke were encouraged to be creative from a very young age by their father, Greg Pretty. Luke and Tess shared how their father did this by painting shapes and images on their tables and chairs at home, as well as helping them make intricate homemade Halloween costumes throughout their childhood.

Once Luke started gaining a following for his electronic style music, the duo decided to fuse their Jazz and Blues background with Luke's electronic and sound sample styled music.

Musical career

2012–2016

In 2014, Luke decided to incorporate electronica into his music, enlisting his sister on drums, and posting the resulting music to SoundCloud. This gained the attention of Canadian producer Ryan Hemsworth, who chose the track "You're Cute" to launch his online imprint "Secret Songs".

Later that year, Tennyson released two tracks: “With You” and “Lay-by.”

In 2015, Tennyson released the Like What? EP with six tracks. The music video for the title track was directed by Fantavious Fritz.

Tennyson performed an opening act for M83's Junk tour in 2016, they were also featured in the Lollapalooza lineup in 2016.

2017–2021

Tennyson performed at numerous music festivals in 2017. They performed alongside artists such as Vince Staples, BADBADNOTGOOD, Dawes, Post Malone, Moby, Wiz Khalifa, Flying Lotus, The Knocks, Chris Lake, Gorillaz, Lorde, blink-182 and Chance the Rapper.

In 2017, Tennyson collaborated with BJ the Chicago Kid and Mr. Carmack to create the EP entitled Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday. The collaborators partnered with Red Bull to release the EP for the Red Bull Sound Select event. Tennyson was also featured on Red Bull’s website.

Later that year, the duo had toured in Europe, Asia and Australia.

On March 1, 2019, Tennyson released Different Water quickly followed by the release of the EP entitled Telescope on November 22, 2019. Different Water has been described as "memorable melodies and busy, layered beats with touches of their jazz background sliding in and out of their compositions".

Different Water and Telescope included more vocal tracks than usual for the duo. Telescope was inspired by Luke's time in Japan and Waneella's viral image. Luke wanted to capture the image's feelings of clarity and stillness through sound in his album.

2022–present

Luke Pretty released his second album entitled Rot on February 18, 2022. The music of Rot was inspired by the musician's struggle with a hearing condition he developed due to mold exposure. Tennyson were listed on Billboard's 10 Dance Artists To Watch in 2022.

In the same year, Tennyson went on various show tours across the North America and Europe. The duo was joined by the guitarist Beau Diako and bassist Akos Forgacs.

Musical style

The pair's "indietronic pop" style of music has been described as "a little R&B, a little jazz, a little classical, divinely characterised through the diverse array of instruments present". Many of their tracks contain organic sounds such as water, fire, and percussive sounds from bongo drums, glass and jungle-inspired beats. They have also been known to sample a wide range of sounds, such as purring cats, ring tones, texting noises, Mac OS sound effects and notably the "door left ajar" car sound in their track "Lay-by".

Following the release of Different Water EP, Luke released a sample pack bearing the same name on Splice.

Discography

Studio albums

Extended plays

Singles

Collaborations

Remixes

References

1. ^ Lester, Paul (2014-07-18). "New band of the week: Tennyson (No 14)". The Guardian. Retrieved 2018-10-21.
2. Maclean, Ellie (2015-03-25). "Live Review: Tennyson at The Sound House". Hot Press. Retrieved 2021-05-20.
3. Weekes, Jabbari (2015-01-30). "Electronic duo Tennyson talk about Barney the Dinosaur's unlikely influence on their music". A.Side TV.
4. Sperounes, Sandra (2014-12-30). "People to watch in 2015: Meet Edmonton's Tennyson". Edmonton Journal.
5. Reya, Luna (2017-10-09). "Life is Beautiful With Tennyson: The Siblings Redefining Electronic Music". Dope Magazine.
6. Conner, Shawn (2017-02-15). "Q&A: Tess Pretty of electronic brother-sister duo Tennyson". Vancouver Sun.
7. "Tennyson". SoundCloud. Retrieved 2022-07-07.
8. "Ryan Hemsworth launches Secret Songs series with Tennyson's ebullient 'You're Cute' – FACT Magazine: Music News, New Music". FACT Magazine: Music News, New Music. 2014-05-07. Retrieved 2018-10-22.
9. "With You / Lay-by, by Tennyson". Tennyson. Retrieved 2022-07-07.
10. "Tennyson's "Like What" Video Is a Tour of a Blind Girl's Imagination". www.vice.com. Retrieved 2022-07-06.
11. Usinger, Mike (2015-11-27). "Tennyson soundtracks movies for your mind with Like What". The Georgia Straight. Retrieved 2022-08-20.
12. Kot, Greg; Williams, Kevin; Swartz, Tracy (2018-06-12). "Lollapalooza day one: Lana del Rey's anti-charisma, J. Cole's momentum issues". Chicago Tribune. Retrieved 2024-10-14.
13. Schiewe, Jessie (2016-12-07). "Here's Your Noise Pop 2017 Lineup". SFWeekly.
14. "Red Bull Sound Select Presents: 30 Days In Chicago—Parquet Courts, Built To Spill, Meat Wave, Good Willsmith" – via do312.
15. Bein, Kat (2017-02-18). "Welcome to the Magically Playful World of Tennyson".
16. "Krunk presents: Tennyson (Can) & Komorebi" – via Resident Advisor.
17. Berlatsky, Noah (2019-03-29). "Tennyson's mellow electronica flows on Different Water".
18. Grandeur, Danny (2019-11-25). "Tennyson Reveals Spectacular New EP 'Telescope". River Beats'.
19. Vigil, Dom (2022-02-18). "Tennyson Drops New Album, "Rot"". Prelude Press.
20. "10 Dance Artists To Watch in 2022". Billboard. 2022-01-02.
21. "Tennyson shares new single and tour dates". Music News. 2022-01-06.
22. Asman, Lauren (2022-04-08). "Tennyson electrifies the Englert Theatre at Mission Creek Festival". KRUI-FM. Retrieved 2022-08-20.
23. "Tennyson's Fantastical Indietronic-Pop-Jazz EP 'Uh Oh!' Is Out Today On OWSLA – NEST HQ". NEST HQ. 2017-09-29. Retrieved 2018-10-22.
24. "Tennyson Made a Song and it Samples the 'Car Door Ajar' Beep". Noisey. 2014-07-09. Retrieved 2018-10-22.
25. "Artist Spotlight: Tennyson – NEST HQ". NEST HQ. 2014-10-08. Retrieved 2018-10-22.
26. Takanami Herman, Kenneth (2019-08-07). "Luke Pretty of Tennyson on sampling strange sounds and performing live".

External links

• Official website

• Canadian electronic music groups
• Owsla artists
• Living people
• Musical groups from Edmonton