From: Hank Blumenthal (hblumenthal@uky.campus.mci.net)
Subject: Tool in Cincinnati, November 16 

This review is delayed because pharmacy school is keeping me down in a 
major way. Tool played at a venue called The Garage which is in Caddy's 
Complex in Cincinnati (not far from Riverfront Stadium for all of you 
non-Ohio Bengals fans). Pretty decent place to see a show - good 
acoustics, proximity to the stage, etc. The opening act was Psychotica. I 
was disappointed when I saw that they were opening. I saw them this 
summer at Lollapalooza and I wasn't impressed. Not that they're not 
talented - just not what I'm into (Helmet, Prong, RATM and of course, 
TOOL). I read the Columbus show review and the singer did some similar 
shit - saying that they were bringing out their "friends" in TOOL, saying 
that they would play two more songs and TOOL would come out, etc. I was 
pleased when they finally walked off stage. Anyway, the roadies came out, 
set up TOOL's equipment, walked off stage and this weird shit fired up 
over the speakers. Just this constant noise that kept building and 
building. This lasted for half an hour. The crowd really got angry after 
about 20 minutes of it. Then the lights went down and the live-action 
version of the AENIMA cover got projected onto the screen behind the drum 
riser - an awesome sight, in my opinion. TOOL then just casually strolled 
out on stage and MJK just stood there, staring at the crowd. The rest of 
the band started up, and MJK started swaying and gaping at the crowd. He 
had a stripe painted down the middle of his body that, of course, got 
sweated off about halfway into the show. Adam Jones also had some paint 
on and a "third eye" painted on his forehead. Justin Chancellor had his 
hair twisted in a couple of places to form little devil horns. That was 
pretty funny. Anyway, they opened with "Third Eye", which rocked, but I 
thought it was a strange track to open with due to its length and medium 
intensity. The crowd went nuts when they started playing "Stinkfist" - 
great song but not my favorite. I'm just glad they didn't open with it - 
I hate it when a band opens with the radio track. They did pretty much 
everything off of AENIMA except "H." and "Hooker with a Penis" and 
everything sounded great. I was impressed by so many aspects of the band 
- their "tightness", the quality of the sound, MJK's vocal range. He was 
doing all of those trademark long-ass screams. I was amazed at the lungs 
he's got. The high point of the show, in my opinion, was "Eulogy" - a 
kick-ass song which they performed flawlessly, intro and all. The 
multimedia slide show behind the band was great, too. Some of the stuff 
they were showing was pretty trippy. During "Prison Sex", they showed the 
video in reverse negative, which enhanced the creepiness of the song. The 
best thing they showed was during "Pushit" - slow-motion, reverse 
negative footage of an african tribal dance which at some point, turned 
into elephants and camels fucking. I was rolling. The only songs from 
Undertow were "Sober", "Prison Sex", and "Swamp Song". He had some 
commentary prior to "Prison Sex" which I can't seem to recall - something 
about the song as therapy for what he's been through. The hilarious part 
came during a pause in the show. MJK was getting a drink when someone 
shouted out "CRAWL AWAY!", to which MJK replied, "Yeah, that's a TOOL 
song. Anyone know some more TOOL songs?" The crowd of course began 
screaming and I don't remember what they played after that. The last song 
they played in their regular set was "AEnema" and it, naturally, rocked. 
He made a comment before the song about the song being about Jungian 
philosophy and high colonics. They did "Opiate" as an encore - MJK made a 
comment about the song being misunderstood and that he felt the central 
ideas of religions were "valid" but that it was the purveyors of religion 
that were corrupted (or something to that effect). Then that was it. In 
all, they played about 1-1/2 hours, pretty much standard in my opinion, 
but the quality of the show was unmatched by any I've seen. Any pharmacy 
school geeks can contact me at the above e-mail address. LEARN TO 
SWIM......