Tenci principal singer-songwriter Jess Shoman. Credit: Photo via tenci.band/Facebook
Chicago’s alt-weekly, The Reader, might as well be a periodical for those who seek to learn more about the midwest’s best emerging indie-rock. Last year, the publication’s music guru Leor Galil had about a dozen nice things to say about Tenci, the bedroom project turned quartet fronted by Windy City singer-songwriter Jess Shoman.

The outfit—touring behind a new album A Swollen River, A Well Overflowing—is for fans of bands like Squirrel Flower, but also Big Thief and its guitarist Buck Meek who shares a record label with Tenci.

The lush arrangements never rattle your eardrums and instead embrace you in a wash of saxophone, violin, flute, clarinet and xylophone all driven by rootsy, electrified folk that’s some of the best stuff coming to Tampa Bay this week.

Tickets to see Tenci with Kick Veronica on Sunday, Jan. 29 at 7 p.m. are on sale now for $12.

This article appears in Jan 26 – Feb 1, 2023.

Read his 2016 intro letter and disclosures from 2022 and 2021. Ray Roa started freelancing for Creative Loafing Tampa in January 2011 and was hired as music editor in August 2016. He became Editor-In-Chief...