Spring 1997 Tour Reviews

Date: April 7


Review written by: Tim Adams (tadams@scuc.edu.au) Review posted on: 04/17/97 12:33:48 I'm not going to worry about the list of songs as it doesn't really matter, all I can say is that they played their singles and crowd favourites, except for Hooker With a Penis and several others, and put on one hell of a show. Two giant screens projecting computer based art stood behind the band, showcasing bits and pieces from their clips and other footage, from naked jungle men to giant white flames, the same as the cover of Aenima. I had a different view to the other reviewers as I was seated, as apposed to the mosh where I so dearly wanted to be. The bands energy, which was totally consumed in their music, seemed to be held back and very limited. Allthough Maynard's dancing was a bit of a pleasure. He danced (or stomped) better than the support bands (Shihad) lead singer, who seemed to need a laxative or something. Tool's stage presence surpased nearly all bands I have seen live, only equal to (don't laugh) Garbage at Livid. Shirley Manson's demeanour was similar Maynard's as they both struted around the stage, and had an evilish look in their eyes. I think that the look coming from Maynard had more to do with his blue painted body with red splotches, with no doubt a meaning behind. I left with the feeling that I had just witnessed one of the world's best bands, and also the feeling that unprotected sex was cool (thankyou once again Maynard!!!)

Review written by: William Kellar (n2154960@student.fit.qut.edu.au) Review posted on: 04/13/97 15:41:13 DO NOT READ THIS UNLESS YOU HAVE ALREADY SEEN TOOL. YOU WILL NOT ENJOY THE SHOW IF YOU ALREADY KNOW WHAT IS GOING TO HAPPEN. If you can't be bothered fishing through the rest of the document, Here's the setlist: Third eye Stinkfist Forty-six & 2 Eulogy Pushit prison sex sober opiate Aenima I'm pretty sure that's the correct order... The support band on this monday night was a New Zealand band called "Shehad". They came on about a quarter past eight and played a half hour set. Their music wasn't anything extraordinary, but on the other hand it wasn't crap either. They were a pretty basic band without anything that was uniquely theirs. One good thing i can say for them is that they varied the time signature of their songs. I remember one song that went into 5/4 time during the chorus which was pretty cool. At about 9pm the music changed to some ambient stringy sort of stuff. It sounded a little like Nine-Inch-Nails' "A Warm place". I didn't pay much attention to it until it reached a certain volume (after about ten minutes) then i realised that it was getting louder and louder and increasing in its complexity. At 9.15 the curtains behind the stage opened and revealed two very large screens with an animated version of the symbol from the front of AEnima. There was a really loud bassy sound - possibly feedback on a bass guitar - that shook everything. It sounded like a rocket taking off. After about two minutes of this, band made their way onto stage. Maynard was painted entirely blue and had orange things stuck to his head in an arrow shape. My friend went up to the very front and told me that he also had them on his limbs as well. "He does jujitsu, he has them stuck on all the pressure points." He was wearing a pair of white boxer shorts with blue dots all over them. Justin was painted purple and was wearing army jeans. Adam was wearing jeans and a white shirt that had some design on the front, but i couldn't make out what it was. Danny didn't show himself until the end. I think he was wearing jeans - i can't remember. He is a BIG sonovabitch. He was about a foot taller than the other band members and was built like a brick shithouse. I wouldn't like to meet him in a dark alley. They stuffed about with their instruments for a while and then broke into the start of "Third eye" with Adam's slide-guitar solo. It was absolutely amazing. This was the best song they played all night. They then went straight into "stinkfist". It was a little different from the album version. They put a couple of extra bars in to build up the excitement at various places. It was well done. I only heared three "Chickenweasels" at the end. They came from myself, and the two people next to me. We felt weired but at least didn't get beaten up. Then we heared maynard speak for the first time; "Hello Brisbane. Brisbane, this is Justin. Justin this is Brisbane." After which Justin started the introduction into "Forty-six & 2". It was almost identical to the album version, but Adam did a different solo that featured much more wah-wah. It was cool. There was an excellent animation on the screens during this song. Maynard spoke again: "It's our roadie's birthday today. His name is Pete. Pete is from Brisbane" Now that i think about it, he was really emphasising the fact that he knew where we lived. Maynard made some comment about what tool is about "Some people think that tool is about hate and death" [a few dickheads in the crowd cheer] "But that's not it. We're about love, tolerance, having feelings, choosing compassion instead of fear." [The crowd went silent for a few seconds, not sure how to react, then started cheering] I've forgotton just how he worded it, but it was really inspiring. They then started "eulogy". Maynard was making that weird sound at the start with his mouth. I'm not sure how. During the song there was an animation of a monkey walking along. As the song progressed the monkey slowly evolved and stood up. I think the next song was "pushit". It started with Adam playing a cool arabian guitar solo. It went for about a minute until he broke into the main riff. The song was pretty much identical to the album version. It was really cool at the end of the song when Maynard sung "I must persuade you another way" and several hundred people sung exactly the same note. I can't really explain it, but it sounded a bit like when the needle on an old record player is moved - That tearing sort of sound - but it was caused by the whole audience singing almost the exact same note. IT SOUNDED EXCELLENT. After the song finished, maynard made another of his speeches. "Ever since the catholic church removed everything feminine, everything logical, everything intuitive, you people have been bought up being afraid of sex. If you have sex, you are going to die so you don't do it. I see all of you smoking out there. Smoking will kill you. You're gonna all die." [More dickheads cheer at the mention of death] "We're all going to die. Me - I'd rather die having hot passionate sex! That's what this song is about." The band started playing "prison sex" It was good. They put in the extra verse. I don't know the words but it had the same tune to a part of "third eye". When it finished the band (minus Danny of course) slowly squatted down at the front of the stage. I couldn't see exactly what they were doing but i think they were playing with their guitar effects. Maynard was playing around with a big circle (I think it was the skin off a bass drum). I thought it was good, but some of the crowd got restless. A fan managed to make his way past the security guards and climbed up onto the stage and promptly jumped off it. Tool didn't even look at him. They stuffed about making strange sounds for ten minutes until they finally broke into the start of sober. "This is our last song" [Boooo] "off our first album" [Yayyyy] [Adam plays the first two notes of "opiate"] "Opiate" was similar to the version on the prison sex single. It had a big feedback solo at the end by adam. As the song was drawing to a close, I was hoping they would play "flood" like the did on the prision sex single and like they did when i saw them in 1995. They didn't, much to my disappointment. When they finished stuffing around they put their instuments down and danny came down. The four of them stood there doing something (couldn't see but they had their backs to the audience). They formed a tight group and had what looked like a team huddle. Maynard spoke: "Do you all want to sing happy birthday to pete?" [Crowd yells yes] "Tough shit!" then he started those words.. "hey, hey, hey, hey...." That was the last song. They went off stage and after a few minutes some music started over the PA. It took me a while but i finally figured out that they were playing songs that had been on "The Simpsons". Adam hardly moved for the entire performance. I really respect him for that. He just stood there looking down at his hands making sure he was playing the right thing. Justin was the same, but we could see more of his face (due to the lack of hair). It's good to see that Tool is more concerened with playing the music well than looking "cool". The guys on the mixing desk did a good job. The accoustics of Festival Hall aren't the best for concerts. I have been to concerts there where i couldn't make out any speaking between songs due to the amount of distortion. Whenever maynard spoke, I could make out exactly what what he was saying. They didn't play "jimi" as i had hoped. I could swear that I heard them playing it during the sound check before the concert. When I left the concert I felt as if the concert was missing something. I felt a little let down, quite possibly because I had read other people's reviews.

From: Tim Cederman-Haysom (vision@innocent.com) Subject: Brisbane Tool Concert Hi everyone The Brisbane Tool concert was on last night.. I went with 4 of my friends and one of their little brothers. The set list went something like: Third Eye Stinkfist Eulogy 46&2 Prison Sex Instrumental Sober Pushit Opiate Aenema Anyone else who was there and thinks I'm wrong please tell me... Ok it was a fairly short set, around an hour and a half. I met up with Nic and Jud early in the evening (by accident, Nicole seemed to notice us and got our attention by skipping next to my brother who didn't recognise her :P) Jud went and met Danny and Adam I think...please correct me Jud... I didn't see them much. Shihad opened for Tool... a New Zealand band... and they played for about 45 min. An ok band... I had my ear plugs in to save my hearing for Tool... definitely a good move. Shihad's singer looked like Steady Eddie on drugs (or Alanis Morisette during a particularly energetic concert... one word: spasmodic). They ripped through about 6 songs... Reasonably good. Then a lot of standing around... They played JOHN FARNHAM (awful mainstream australian musician) over the PA while we waited. Gawd, the number of people who were wearing Tool shirts.. at least 60% of the crowd. Unbelievable. Then this noise started up and everyone stood up but the lights didn't go off... it was this kind of ambient noise which got louder and louder..then it shut up, and the lights went off. The bass feedback started up and the smokescreens (2 of em) showed up... I could feel my clothes shaking and my leg hairs shaking too... GREAT bass... then Tool came on and Maynard was wearing the usual... white boxers with a criss-cross style pattern on them, in blue with reflective dots on his head etc, with Adam being himself, Justin with his devil hair and blue paint and Danny without a shirt... A lot of feedback and then Danny started the drums for Third Eye, and everyone went wild. It was pretty good... a bit muffled... no one was really moshing, but being one of my favourite songs I really wanted to... but I couldn't with everyone just standing around..bleh... then Stinkfist started... I shoved my way to the front of the moshpit till I was about 2.5metres from Tool... all the kiddy boppers followed ;) Still it was pretty good with the jam in the middle of it fooling (almost) everyone (you could hear people screaming "I'll keep di-" and just cutting off)... Then Eulogy which had something extra at the end. The kiddyboppers enjoyed 46&2 and Prison Sex and again, (almost) everyone was a bit put off by the extra lyrics in Prison Sex. In the background on the back two video displays they had this trippy 3D computer graphic till Prison Sex, when they put a negative of the video clip to it on the screens... it was kinda remixed... Then during 46&2 the two girls in front of me started kissing err... so it kinda got a bit awkward to try and mosh around them. (also a bit distracting) Turns out they were waiting for Opiate...I told em it'd be the last song so they said "oh ok" and left the moshpit... Sober seemed to have a bit extra in it... I'm not sure. Pushit got everyone fired up of course. I think it's a bit dangerous to play that ;) Then they launched into Opiate after the usual "Last song off the first album" jazz... Everyone loved that and sang along to it. They then sort of had this conference with themselves while everyone screamed "encore"... they did this for about 30 seconds then Maynard came back and started his "hey hey hey hey" routine for Aenema and that was definitely the best mosh of the night. What else happened? - Maynard told the crowd that the image of Tool was wrong, that they weren't about hate, etc, but more about emotion. I can't remember much of it. Ask Nicole ;) - Maynard told all the smokers they were going to die and wouldn't it be better to die from wild passionate sex? That sex was a great energy and yet we were too afraid of it. Things I can quote: - "Brisbane." (crowd cheers) - "Justin meet Brisbane, Brisbane meet Justin" - "It's our sound manager's birthday. He likes Ruffles Potato Chips. How bout we sing him happy birthday? Well tough cookies cuz we're not." Several other things were said.. I can't remember them sorry. - During Opiate when the crowd wasn't moshing and I was about 5 metres from the stage, (I'm 6'2" or so, so I was sticking out above the crowd) Maynard locked eyes with me for a good 15-20 seconds. Spooky. - On the background monitors at various times were more inverse pictures... particularly during Sober with small clips from it. Also pictures of tribesmen jumping up and down and elephants having sex. During the start of stinkfist was an animation of a caveman. - At the start, Maynard just stood staring at the crowd, holding the microphone (only one) like a gun and staring at the crowd, not moving for about three or four minutes. Bad points of the evening: THE FUCKING CROWD SURFERS!!! Some of 'em were ok and just let themselves be carried along. The girls were ok... but some of the guys thrashed around and hurt you a lot. I didn't get kicked in the head, but I had a few people LAND on my head without warning... Although I must admit I helped a few people up, they weren't the psycho idiots. DICKHEAD TESTOSTERONE-POISONED MOSHERS! Idiots that just shoved and hit everyone around them. I punched a few after they deliberately pushed me/elbowed me/etc. Cleared me a nice little space in the pit. ;) THE SONG CHOICE! H., Bottom (wishful thinking but hey), Jimmy, and Hooker with a Penis weren't played. Very disapointing. TOOL'S ENERGY! Lacklustre to say the least.. they did NOT seem to be enjoying the show or putting much energy into it. Anyway, sorry about the length. Any problems with the review, can someone who went please correct me... Thanks, Tim

From: Brett James (n1898744@student.fit.qut.edu.au) Subject: TOOL concert monday 7th of April MIME-Version: 1.0 Hi there, just got back from the concert and it ROCKED. Best I've been to and I've been to them all: NIN, Pantera, White Zombie, Peal Jam. Their setlist was (mostly the right order): (-)Ions Turd Eye Stinkfist 46 & 2 Prison Sex Eulogy Pushit Sober Opiate Aenema The Show was perfect except for some absolute FUCKHEAD that had a red laser pointer. They first used it on Maynard halfway through Stinkfist and Maynard freaked at first. He turned is back to the crowd for about 30 seconds then continued like nothing had happend. The way he got back into the song without seeming to be worried astounded me. I nearly shit myself thinking that maybe they would stop early. The second they used it was in 46 & 2 and when it happened he walked to the back of the stage and told someone where it was coming from then continued on again like nothing had happened. The third time was really shitty. During the 15 min intro to Sober, Maynard had drawn something on the ground using the outline of a drum cover then drew symbols all around it. He started meditating, just staring into the crowd, then the laser beam came on again. Maynard was so pissed off, he walked off the stage to the back and told the same guy where it was. He came back, had a drink then just stared at the drum set. This was the last time it happened. If you ever see anyone at a concert doing this, fuck them up bad. I mean it, it totally ruined the concert. I kep thinking how bad it was for them, and wondering if they would ever come back to Brisbane. Things Maynard said: It was Pete's birthday (?), the guy who does the extra guitar bits, and maynard said he was from Brisbane. He talked about how people thought TOOL were about hate and things like that and he explained about what TOOL were all about. He talked about how sex is the most natural thing and how we were all afraid to kill ourselves by having sex and catching diseases yet we were happy killing ourselves with alcohol and cigerettes. Maynard introduced "Justin this is Brisbane, Brisbane - Justin" He didn't talk much after the laser light, It really affected him inside I think. I was he only one shouting ChickenWeasel. And everyone else around was going "thats not a song". Maynard did his writhing act all throughout the set, not really looking at the crowd once, but looking through the crowd. He was painted blue with the orange spots and was wearing a pair of Boxer shorts with the TOOL spanner logo on them. It was so hot that at the end he had sweated most of the paint off. It was a brilliant show and I just hope that the laser light doesn't stop him from coming back again. See ya at the next show,

From: jones (jonesy@om.com.au) Subject: review for april 7 concert I got to the hall at 7.00 when tool did there sound check(i think adam was playing flood) the backup band was" shihad "they were feom N.Z they werent bad actually Tool came on at 9.00 , maynard was painted blue with these cool orange dots the made an arrow on hes head and ran down his chest and arms, justine was the same except for the dots painted blue all over with two small horns on his head , that were made his hair.Danny walked on with adam in plain clothing but danny lost nthe shirt during the night (im not sure when) I cant remember exactly what they played but these were some (not in order) 1 negative ions 2 stinkfist 3 Ænema 4 opiate 5 euolgy 5 sober(with extended intro) 6 prison sex 7 pushit 8 third eye that is as much as i can remember When the lights went out for the start of negative ions the crowd went mad ,im only 16 and not to tall so this became a problem cause people crushed me alot. After third eye maynard introduced Justine to the crowed and said happy birthday to pete the sound man.Then explained how most people think tool is about violence but they're not about that at all, after which all the idiots in the crowed booed maynard. The intro to sober was extented heaps which made it one best songs of the night , adam had three epiladys on the strings of his guitar , two were stuck to it some how while the other he held i his hand and ran it up and down the stings.Justine just kept playing riffs the whole time , danny played a beat that changed through out the piece , and maynard looked to be drawing something on the stage cause he went to the base of danny's drum kit and picked up pens or something then looked to meditate after the drawing was finished. Just before opiate maynard talked about how when the church has made sex a taboo subject and how we are afraid to have have sex because we might die but he can see people smoking which will kill you , then half yelled , half said "everyone dies" Last of all was Ænema ,tool was on stage for just over an hour and a half.