The experimental rock band Tortoise will be performing at the
Henry Fonda Theatre tomorrow night for one of only four shows on
the West Coast. The tour actually started as a single show at San
Francisco’s Noise Pop festival, but the band decided to
extend it to include stops in Los Angeles, Seattle and Santa
Cruz.
As Tortoise’s producer, drummer and mastermind John
McEntire explained, the band actually prefers these sort of mini
tours.
“We’d much rather play fewer shows more often than
wait for a big tour that would just burn us all out,” said
McEntire.
But their unconventional touring schedule is hardly the most
unconventional thing about Tortoise. Though still technically a
rock band, the group has spent the last decade creating some of the
most innovative and unusual music on the fringes of the rock
spectrum.
In many ways, Tortoise actually has more in common with a jazz
band than a rock group. All of the band’s music is
instrumental, and its performances are very group-oriented, with a
give-and-take ethic between the musicians, creating an intricate
overall sound, but also allowing the individual members to display
their instrumental skills.
“A lot of times our songs get more realized by playing
them live,” said McEntire “We sort of figure out where
each instrument fits in the larger sound of the song.”
While its looser live shows provide Tortoise with a forum to
perfect and play with its songs, the group is just as happy in the
more structured studio environment.
“I guess it’s a little strange, but we really
don’t mind putting hours and hours into just working on tiny
slivers of music,” said McEntire, “I could do it all
day.”
Drawing from many influences including space music, dub, ambient
and, yes, Krautrock, Tortoise plays unpredictable songs that veer
off into several directions at unusual points. The group balances
noodling on the guitar and keyboard with strong beats and rhythms
that don’t stagnate but don’t build to a climax either.
The band’s music avoids clear song structures.
The truth is, it’s really tough to accurately describe
Tortoise’s music. It doesn’t fit comfortably into any
definable genre, which is why many simply call the band’s
type of music experimental or post-rock.
“I honestly don’t think about labels,” said
McEntire. “People can call our music whatever they want, but
I think calling something “˜experimental’ is a little
off. I mean, things on the radio now would be considered
experimental just a few years ago.”
Despite McEntire’s dislike of the label experimental, his
band has come to be one of the few groups inspiring plenty of
followers, especially in its hometown Chicago.
Part of the reason there have been so many followers of Tortoise
is that the band’s members have started many of their own
side projects. Groups like The Sea and Cake, Isotope 217, My Dad is
Dead and Eleventh Day Dream all involve one or several members of
Tortoise, creating a community of experimental bands and a
significant post-rock scene in Chicago.
Throughout the decade Tortoise has been around, the
group’s sound and lineup has changed with each album,
sometimes being as large as seven members or as few as five.
At tomorrow night’s show, Tortoise will be premiering
several new songs it has been working on for its fifth studio album
due out in July or August this year. But McEntire was unclear about
what direction the new album would take.
“I’m not sure what it’s going to sound like.
It remains to be seen if anything will be different, maybe it will
just be the exact same record,” joked McEntire.