Tortoise

Douglas McCombs and John Herndon from post-rock band Tortoise go record shopping at Amoeba San Francisco in this "What's In My Bag?" episode. From Tom Verlaine, Silent Serpent, David Thomas of Pere Ubu, and Broadcast, it may seem like they only pick albums by dead musicians. But never fear, they talk about some living artists too! Touch, the first new Tortoise album since 2016, is out now via Nonesuch / International Anthem.

Tortoise's picks:
• Budgie - The Absence: Memoirs of a Banshee Drummer (BOOK)
• Tom Verlaine - Dreamtime (LP)
• Louis Jordan - Jukebox Jump (LP)
• David Thomas - Monster Walks The Winter Lake (LP)
• Silent Servant - In Memoriam (12")
• Broadcast - Tender Buttons (LP)
• Hound Dog Taylor and the HouseRockers - Natural Boogie (LP)
• Bill Orcutt - Another Perfect Day (LP)
• Emptyset - Dissever (LP)
• Wah! - Nah=Poo - The Art Of Bluff (LP)
• Oneohtrix Point Never - R Plus Seven (LP)
• The Durutti Column - The Return Of The Durutti Column [45th Anniversary Edition] (LP)
• Peaches - No Lube So Rude (LP)

Featured Artist: Tortoise

Editor: Michael Cruz
Executive Producer: Rachael McGovern
Producer/Director: Gabriel Wheeler
Producer: Craig Miller
Cameras: Gabriel Wheeler, Michael Cruz
Audio Recorded by: Gabriel Wheeler
Assistant Editor: Patrick Emswiler

Watch Tortoise's "What's In My Bag?" episode on Amoeba.com

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Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Hi, I'm Douglas McCombs. I'm John Herndon from The Van Tortoise, and we're here at Amoeba Music, and this is what's in our bags. The new book by Budgie, who was the drummer most famously probably for Susie and the Banshees, but he also plays on the first Slits record. What an awesome drummer. I'm psyched to check it out.

SPEAKER_00 0:42

I never wanted to leave the Slits until I did. I love the Slits and I love the songs we've done together. It wasn't like I had somewhere else to go or anything else to do, but I made the decision to leave.

SPEAKER_02 1:05

Television is sort of ground zero for me. I mean, they weren't my first favorite band, but they are my favorite band. I'm really into lots of Verlaine solo work. A couple years ago when he died, the song that sort of stuck with me and I kept playing over and over again is this song The Blue Robe. It's kind of like his gateway into his instrumental music. And this whole record's really great.

SPEAKER_01 2:14

It's kind of like proto rock and roll. Jump blues, maybe? RB, early RB. Super amazing.

SPEAKER_04 2:21

I love you. Love you just the same. I'll always love you, B, because Caledonia is your name.

SPEAKER_02 2:30

My next pick is this David Thomas record.

SPEAKER_03 2:33

It goes something like this. It goes everything is like something. Anything like something else.

SPEAKER_02 2:43

David Thomas famously of Para Ubu, sort of the only constant member of Para Ubu throughout the decades. I saw him open by himself for the Gang of Four, like 81. He was on stage with a boom box, a big piece of illustration board on an easel, and he was drawing stuff, and he had the illustration board mic'd, and he was like making sounds within stuff and telling stories and singing little songs to the boom box. To me, that was completely punk rock and so fearless to do that. And just by standing by himself on a stage, it was incredible, amazing. This particular one is one that I have not heard before, but he's been on my mind the last couple years because not to be morbid, but he also passed away a couple years ago. And so I'd been on some para Ubu kicks and I wanted to check this out.

SPEAKER_05 3:34

I'm up with you!

SPEAKER_01 3:39

I got the silent servant record in memoriam. We're picking records by only people who have died. That's not true, but this guy tragically died a couple of years ago in Italy along with his girlfriend and another person. LA legendary techno electronic music on Tresero Records. I'm excited to listen to it.

SPEAKER_02 4:16

I have this broadcast record. This is like kind of my favorite band of the last 25 years. What I admire most about it is completely exploded version of like perfect pop music, but like done in such, you know, so abstracted and so strange, like their music got more and more abstract, but retained all of like the sort of like beautiful melodic pop ideas as the music got more disjointed and abstract. And I just love it. Trisha's voice, and also not to be morbid anymore than I have been already, but Trish died 10 or 15 years ago, and that was a huge loss. She and her partner, they were the constant members of this group, and they were just making incredible stuff, mostly as a duo, contributions by other people occasionally, but great partnership, amazing.

SPEAKER_01 5:30

I don't know this record, but the first Hound Dog Taylor in the House Rockers record on Alligator has been on repeat for me for the last 20 years. Chicago Original. Ted Harvey on drums, one of the greatest blues drummers of all time. And Brewer Phillips, who plays all the bass parts on guitar, is amazing also.

SPEAKER_02 6:15

Tortoise has been lucky enough to have him playing on some of the shows we've been doing over the last few months. The thing I love about Bill is that he's taking like Verlainisms and quinisms, like American primitive stuff, and then spiky, like noisy improv stuff, and he's playing it all at the same time, kind of. These beautiful moments of quiet and beautiful melody, and then like spiky, noisy stuff, going into just like weird finger style stuff. He's kind of got his own finger style. It's not really American primitive, but it's like this thing that he's developed of his own, kind of, which is super interesting. It's been really great to witness over the last few years. Really honored to have him play.

SPEAKER_01 7:07

This is De Sever by Empty Set on Thrill Jockey. I love their record blossoms and I love the self-titled record. I haven't heard this one, but they have the some of the greatest tones in all of electronic music. Super abstract, really mechanical and alien and weird, but it's really lovely.

SPEAKER_02 8:06

I have this wow record. I'm not even sure I remember what this record sounds like, but I used to have it. But the interesting part of it is the story of these three guys in Liverpool in the late 70s when punk was sort of like happening over there. These three like teenagers that didn't play instruments started this band called The Crucial Three, and it was just them sitting around drinking beer. They didn't have any songs or they didn't play any instruments or anything. One of them was Ian McCullough from Echo and the Bunny Men and Jillian Cope from The Teared Up Explodes. And then this guy, Pete Wiley, and they all three started these like sort of influential Liverpool bands from that living room beer drinking band called The Crucial Thread, which never played a note. That's that's my story.

SPEAKER_01 9:09

I found this 10 Tricks Point Never record. I've never heard this one, but I've been really beating his new one, Tranquilizer. He's kind of like a weird sound collage musician. I can't actually tell what the hell is going on in the making of his music, but boy do I love it. Psyched to check this out.

SPEAKER_02 9:48

This pick is the Drury column. British guitar player Vince Riley, who mostly played with a drum machine or just a single drummer, never a full band. This has just been reissued, so it's back on my radar, and I haven't heard it in a long time. I'm just psyched to dive back into it.

SPEAKER_01 10:24

Here's the new Peaches record. No lube so rude. First one is called Hangin' Titties.

SPEAKER_05 10:30

Older than you, looking to con look at you, I'm a con. Thirsty much, my hangin' titties hit like the pun.

SPEAKER_01 10:37

The next one is called Fuck Your Face.

SPEAKER_05 10:39

Fuck your face, your face, your face.

SPEAKER_06 10:43

Fuck your face, your face, your face.

SPEAKER_01 10:46

I'm so happy that she is out there doing her thing and embracing all of the weirdos out there, myself included, all the queer, weird sex people. I'm so happy she's doing it and being super vocal and being very public about it, about like weird, queer, consensual, sex positive shit. We were playing in Seattle and went to go see her and it was amazing. And afterwards we went to this weird donut shop, and while we were there, she came in with another person, and the guy was like, I made special peaches donuts for you. A little starstruck. But I just got like an apple fritter and went home.

SPEAKER_02 11:29

Apple fritter?

SPEAKER_01 11:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 11:31

No lead. So rude.

SPEAKER_01 11:36

Awesome guys. Well, thank you for shopping with us today.

SPEAKER_02 11:39

Thank you. Thanks so much. Thanks for having us.