This Doesn’t Bode Well for Tool Fans

As of this writing, it has been 9 years, 5 months and 27 days since the release of the last Tool album. Put another way, there hasn’t been a new Tool record since the iPhone was introduced. Yes, there were interminable legal problems that prevented the band from moving forward, but they’ve all been settled. So what’s the holdup?

Who knows? This is Tool. They do things at their own pace in their own way.

There were rumours of new music coming together–huzzah!–but now there are these comments from Maynard James Keenan from an interview in the Phoenix New Times.

He acknowledges that there was indeed humor in the Tool albums. But as with any time he’s asked about Tool, his answers quickly become curt. A hint of exasperation creeps into his voice and he exhales heavily through his nose.

“Yeah, it’s there,” he says. “But people miss it because they’re so focused on the other bullshit.”

He shakes his head.

“It’s lost. Insufferable people . . . It’s just ridiculous, retards. I’m sorry. Can’t help them. Way too serious. Too much. Lighten up.”

Did he have to corral the other band members to play this one show in 2015?

“No, they had to con me into it.”

Deftones is also playing the festival. Are we going to hear “Passenger,” the Deftones song featuring Keenan guesting on vocals? Keenan hasn’t performed it live in more than a decade.

He shakes his head vigorously.

Then the million-dollar question: When’s the next Tool album coming out?

“There’s nothing to say,” he says. “I can’t.”

“Insufferable retards?” The people that made Tool into the mythological monster they are?  Really?.  Read the whole story here. Maynard talks a lot about wine.