TORTOISE - Beacons Of Ancestorship

I really, really didn't want to admit it at the time, but Tortoise's last full-length, 2004's languid It's All Around You, was a big letdown. So many years of defending the Chicago quintet's esoteric (and up to that point, uniformly great) prog-jazz-electro had blinded me to the fact that the disc was sleek, but gutless—like some sonic IKEA catalogue. Five years later, the band returns and there's no need to be coy here: it's a killer. It's not as though the band has gone punk or lo-fi—engineer/drummer John McEntire's attention to detail would still embarrass a brain surgeon—but this reptile has a fire in its belly and savvy in its bones. "High Class Slim Came Floatin' In" kicks things off like a leaner, meaner reprise of '96's multi-suite classic "Djed"—albeit at a 1/3 of the running time. From there on in, it's pretty much golden. The burping martial synth of "Northern Something" is a definite highlight, as is return-to-form closer "Charteroak Foundation" and the bouncy, yet elegant "Gigantes." All in all, same old Tortoise for sure, just a little more muscular and purposeful. And playful too—the impossibly-named "Yinxianghechengqi" opens with the ubiquitous stock Wilhelm scream used in seemingly every action movie since the '50s, through to Star Wars and on. Nerds.