Esplanade Presents | Mosaic Music Series Tortoise (USA)

“Touch reminds you how much fun Tortoise are, how seriously they take these musical ideas and how utterly unseriously they take themselves.” – UNCUT magazine Tortoise is “body music for head people”, according to Pitchfork. Emerging out of Chicago, USA in 1990, the band was one of the few essential bands that charted a path for post-rock at a time when the genre was still defining itself. Unlike their international contemporaries—Mogwai favoured ominous atmospheres and weighty distortions while Sigur Ros drew inspiration from Icelandic landscapes to create sweeping ambient sounds—Tortoise was recognised for their eclectic influences and profound technicality. Landmark records like Millions Now Living Will Never Die and TNT bore elements of jazz and krautrock peppered with electronica flourishes, anchored by gnarly grooves and off-kilter time signatures. Body music for head people, indeed. In 2025, the band released their eighth album, Touch. Eschewing some of the minimalism that feature in older records, Touch unapologetically embraces grand gestures with aerodynamically re-engineered krautrock, hand-cranked techno rave-ups and spaghetti Western fanfares. The record is big, bold, fun, and a reintroduction to a band that truly does not need introduction. The records only tell half the story. Tortoise’s legacy goes beyond its recorded output, per Rolling Stone who deems Tortoise