TOOL - C/D!?

Hmm, now the Lollapalooza 1993 flashbacks are kicking in (Maynard backed up Layne pretty well on "Rooster," it has be said).

Are they scared to write a memorable song?

Desperate but not serious, I see.

I like it too! I have my parallels. ;-)

-- Alex in Baghdad (fdslk...), May 4th, 2006.

so, Primus and Tool started nu-metal. Wow. I can see how Rage are linked but if you can say just because the band members of Korn and Linkin Park admire Tool, that they were the god fathers, you'd be a ratard. They probably also like the agression in bands like Pantera, doesn't mean they're god fathers to such a god'forsakin' horrid genre though.

My friend Tom out here says that when he went to get the album on the day of release, they had already sold out at the Best Buy he was at, and the various fans there forlornly looking for a record and commiserating with him on the state of affairs included a Mexican-American woman in her late forties and a biker dude in his late twenties or so. Tool, the band that brings everyone together (when the uberfans don't get in the way).

"Its sound can change because of technology, but most of the time you can´t guess the release year of a song you don´t know. It doesn´t follow trends."

"Its music does not have lyrics with common topics you can found in radio"

A Perfect Tool among many!

maybe it's the political climate, or perhaps it's the effect of the internet becoming more pervasive and ubiquitous than ever. perhaps it is the entering of saturn into uranus, activating thelemic archetypes on the third level of the etheric plane. perhaps i am tired and trying too hard.

so: did it grow? because after one listen i'm not sure when i'll go back. surprisingly dull. but i have this sneaking suspicion i need to put more time in with it; that i missed something.

OTM. Seen them in Düsseldorf last week, they're pretty amazing.

Keep at the vineyard, Keenan, don't mind the studio.

"Tool's dense, often quasi-religious lyrics have always been among the most overwrought in mainstream metal -- no small feat. But the music has such anthemic power that even the most cynical listener can find himself chanting along to lines like "To ascend, you must die!/You must be crucified!"

On 10,000 Days, their fourth album, Tool maintain a level of craftsmanship and virtuosity unparalleled in metal. On the opener, "Vicarious," the quartet reprises its primary formula, which dates back to the 1993 debut, Undertow: Each player keeps his own syncopated version of the central groove until they unite for the first of many spine-tingling crescendos -- then, just as sharply, the foursome de-crescendos into a brooding instrumental jam, as the rhythmic and melodic lines meander and cross until the next explosion. The web of shifting dynamics and time signatures sounds so primal, so visceral, that any lyrical message seems incredibly important.

Singer Maynard Keenan's operatic vocals, alternately simmering and shrill, are more personal and less pretentious here than ever before. The album title refers to the time between when Keenan's mother became paralyzed in the 1980s and when she died, in 2003, an experience that inspires some of Keenan's most poignant lyrics yet ("10,000 days in the fire is long enough/You're going home"). More than fifteen years into Tool's career, he has composed words with the depth and resonance to match the music."

no comment.

Simon: I really kinda mainline Tool at this point -- I hesitate to say they do no wrong, but anyway. Like I mentioned above, my initial listens were a bit deflating, but then I caught the 'mood' of the album, for lack of a better term, and it all made sense.

Whatever your feelings towards them that description is just wrong. I would have thought The Guardian could afford to employ more kowledgable writers.