Tortoise-
TNT (Thrill Jockey)
If Freud and Lacan were music critics, they would have had a field day with Tortoise. The Chicago-based quintet's placid streams of musical unconsciousness are simply equivocal. There are no finite distinctions of musical identity-between the self and the other-anywhere, particularly in its latest album, TNT.
This is even more frustrating, since the band members-Doug McCombs, John Herndon, John McEntire, Dan Bitney and David Pajo-themselves refuse to separate their musical self by identifying, or"mirroring," with other musicians or genres.
Impervious impulses drive Tortoise's music rather than the affected conscious. Its sound, however, is quite rigid and cerebral, even though it seems to be constructed loosely and without forethought. The nebulous, bass-and-dub-heavy pastiche of multiple strings, old synthesizers and keyboards, lurking hiphop beats and uninhibited quirks of jazz, lulls the mind like thick, misty fog- without beginning or end just tranquility.
Nevertheless, Tortoise is decidedly rock in the sense that it places a strong emphasis on the traditional rock ensemble-the drum, the bass and the guitar-rather than appropriated samples that are central in dub-rich fusions. The rather omnipresent dubbing passes by undetected in its music because of the humble manner in which it is accomplished, much like fluid dissolves in films.
Tortoise actually perfected this aesthetic sophistication in its magnum, 20-minute opus "Djed," the pivotal piece of its low-key, commercially unnoticed but nonetheless brilliant 1996 offering, Millions Now Living Will Never Die; and the band certainly reprises it in TNT.
Overall, TNT is quite poetic-almost epic-as its everberating fullness strikes a chord within. The opening track, "Swing from the Gutters," greets its listeners with latent passivity, yet its undeniable majesty is fully rendered. Repetitive guitar chords suspend its dominance throughout the piece, as the jealous bass intermittently lunges forward, vying for the spotlight, even if it means momentarily coating the principal sounds of the guitar. During all this power struggle, the timid drum clashes steadily in the background, and jazz elements, wanting a piece of the action, invades toward the end with its brassy regime of serene saxophone and trombone and finishes off the war.
Upheld by its faux-Dickensonian title, "I Set My Face to the Hillside" manipulates the senses with a provocative xylophone break, coy sounds of maracas and lilting piano. However, with "The Equator," the album shifts its mode, as the sonic setting seems to relocate to a small Sicilian village. A sweeping aria reminiscent of the theme in Godfather, Part I, when sweet Apollonia died, takes its rightful place within TNT. Here, the sensuous melancholy of classical guitar meets the wailing of the maudlin accordion. An exotic element is also present in this track, as spicy breaks, characteristic of Spanish, classic guitar pieces, punctuates the chord shifts.
The album climaxes with "Almost Always Is Nearly Enough" and "Jetty," charged by their muddled dissonance of triphop and the tumultuous hastiness of jungle. However, in "Everglade," TNT returns to the initial, pastoral serenity but is kept alive by its consitent hiphop heartbeats.
Even in its most extroverted moments, TNT is pretty tame, as it chooses to remain pretty languid. But like the renowned 'Tortoise' of the fabled fame, Tortoise patiently toils, and its perserverance pays off at the end. None of the fast-paced, DJ-ing hares will ever be able to catch up to this.
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