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Tortoise

Musical Group
Forlisteners curious about instrumental rock, post-rock, and genre-blending studio craft (from newcomers to long-time fans).
13 Reviews 9 Definitions 31 Charts

The Profile

Tortoise is an American music group from Chicago, widely associated with post-rock and known for largely instrumental, studio-crafted music blending rock instrumentation with electronics and influences from jazz, dub, krautrock, and ambient.

Publicly, Tortoise are commonly described as a Chicago-based post-rock/experimental rock band, active since the early 1990s, and associated with the Thrill Jockey label. In the provided reviews they are repeatedly described as a five-piece/quintet, strongly rhythm-focused, and central to 1990s post-rock discourse.

Across these reviews, Tortoise are framed as a Chicago-based, mostly instrumental band central to 1990s post-rock, admired for meticulous sound, rhythmic invention, and genre-hopping (jazz, dub, krautrock, ambient, electronics). Key peaks repeatedly cited are Millions Now Living Will Never Die (1996) and TNT, with debate over whether “post-rock” is a useful label. Later work like It’s All Around You divides opinion less here than in some remarks about a perceived decline, while Beacons of Ancestorship is treated as a welcome return. Compilations and collaborations (A Lazarus Taxon; In the Fishtank 5; The Brave and the Bold) highlight the band’s breadth beyond core albums.

Who knows Tortoise?

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