SOUND BITES

  Given the luxury of three years or so to create and promote their debut album, Sports Team found themselves more or less established, at least in their homeland UK by the time Deep Down Happy released in mid-2020. Of course, "mid-2020" implies some supremely dismal timing when attempting to capitalize on your own momentum, and without the ability to tour Sports Team saw little return on investment aside from good reviews and a Mercury Prize nomination for their efforts. Holing up in a rented house to hash out their second record, Sports Team approached things from a more personal, less observational perspective. Gulp! , the resulting album (originally meant for release in July but victim of multiple delays due to production issues), is a leaner and more focused affair than Deep Down Happy ; considering the wide rollout for the former combined with the added time together as a unit, this just makes sense. Clocking in at a compact 33 minutes, Gulp! doesn't really fall i...

After releasing a plethora of singles and EPs over the course of their first few years, Deep Down Happy marks the official debut LP from UK upstarts Sports Team; that said, that early material helped them develop a small but rabid fan base in their home country, so it feels just a bit unfair to label them as upstarts.  Whatever their status may be, their first full-length has finally arrived; the run-up has been long, with one of the album's re-recorded tracks first released in 2017, so suffice to say anyone turned onto the band early has been waiting a long time for this. After one listen to Deep Down Happy , I can tell how Sports Team has amassed such a loyal following. Occupying a sonic space somewhere in the neighbourhood of Parquet Courts and Courtney Barnett (hey, this record just happens to be helmed by Burke Reid, who co-produced both of Barnett's LPs!), Sports Team's sound is rough around the edges and fun.  When a band's debut record reminds me of my Album of...