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 title: WORDS ARE TOOLS OF THE TRADE
author: Murry Engleheart

TOOL's Maynard James Keenan has an exotic parrot in his North 
Hollywood home that's train to swear at him. One of its favourite 
terms is "arsehole", a mantr he probably fires of endlessly every time 
the phone rings just in case it is another call from the twisted guy 
whose voice and unsettling threats are the centre piece of Message To 
Harry Manback from TOOL's stunning, �NIMA album,

"It was just this werid guy that was actually staying at Maynard's 
house when we were out on the road", says drummer Danny Carey who once 
played with seventies multi-million selling song queen, Carole King. 
At that time Maynard had a couple of room mates and this guy claimed 
to be the friend of another one that was out on the road doing a sales 
job. The guy started calling 976 sex line numbers and eating all the 
food in the place and finally i guess the other room mate called and 
found out the guy wasn't invited at all, he was just some freeloader 
so they kicked him out. He was so upset that he called back and left 
that message on Maynard's answering machine."

"It's kinda of an experiment with laguague too because Italian is such 
a nice sounding language, it still sounds sort of pretty in a way so 
we just thought we'd put this pretty music behind it."

"It's kind of the same thing with Die Eier Von Satan. It's just an
innocent little message in German but it's so easy for that to be
shifted into something facist rally sounding thing. That was
irresistable"

Right now TOOL are making a music like no other. �NIMA the result of a
near four year gestation period-sweeps away the early broad 
comparisons to Soundgarden and more precisely the Rollins Band and 
see's the outfit edging into a sphere closer to an industrailised King 
Crimson on their Lark's Toungues In Aspic and Starless and Bible Black 
albums or perhaps a state of the art Black Sabbath if Jimmy Page had 
been calling the shots from the producers chair.In some respects it's 
more just a hard,rich music in a broad sense than any sort of rock.

"It's automatically kind of rock because it's electric guitars and 
drums and all of that but we try not to ecer limit ourselves in any 
way. We just do what feels natural and try to play for the songs as 
much as possible and try to put the songs first before we think about
instrumentation or whatever.Whatever the song needs we try to give it
and let it have its own life"

BASICALLY it's all a question of redirecting or trying to expand an
audiences attention span.

"I THINK there are plenty of people out there who are playing three
minute pop songs and i really dont care for any of the bands doing
that. I would just as soon try to appeal to people who might have a
little longer attention span. I think there should be more bands doing
that if they have something to say thats worth listening to."

In there efforts to get that music across to the masses TOOL dont feel
the need to perform the usual media relations hijinx that for the most
are accepted part of the music industry. For example, before one major
show in New York they blew out all their scheduled interviews 
including the pivotal MT. And when MTV's 120 Minutes altered the title 
of the STINKFIST video to Track No 1 MTV's email address was posted on 
TOOL's website and the station besieged by messages from outraged 
fans. The influx of protests was so great that the channel made a on 
air explantion of thier actions. And at a time when the name of New 
Yorks shock radio jock, Howard Stern is on everyones lips and everyone 
wants to be on his, TOOL wouldn't allow their version of Zepplin's NO 
QUATER to be used on the now hugely successful soundtrack to Stern's 
Private Parts movie.

"Its not worth your while really to put a cover song in a soundtrack
beacuse then you don't get any royalities" says a non plused Carey." I
think Page and Plant have enough money coming their way at this 
point" he laughs. We decided to save it for something else.

SOMETHING else might just be the best way to describe the TOOL live
experince. In a sense the band weren't exactly dressed for the 
occasion when they played last Halloween at Radio KROQ's First Annual 
Halloween bash at the American Legion Hall. The tickets said to come 
dressed as ghouls, etc but the band came out bare chested and covered 
in red paint. At least the bloody red reference was fitting.

"It's just about making the show as much one visual experience and one
total experinece as possible. It just makes the lights and the whole
energy thing blend into one a little better. I think having three or 
four individuals standing on a stage kind of pulls it away from 
that. That's the reason we do it.

AND it certainly doesnt harm the band's mystique..." We're just making
the thing fit together where people are hit by the impact of an entire
show. I think it just makes the whole thing a little more cohesive."

ONE thing's for sure you'll never see a TOOL comic or pinball machine
like Cheap Trick or Kiss. The individuals-Keenan aside-are at least
publically virtually indivisible one another.

"I think we kind of have a similiar vision in a way so we just are 
able to keep the band goals in mind and not get too much ego involved 
in it. We're all comfatable with the oulet we've created. The songs 
have turned out to be good vehicles for us to do our personal work 
through and it's working that way. There's alot of honesty invovled in 
it and I think that's why it translates so strongly to the fans 
too.We're pretty comfortable where were working at this point"

So do enough fans really understand TOOL or are their instincts 
enough?

"ACTUALLY we're not so concerned whether they really get it or
not. They'll get it on some level or another and the upper level will
reach their subconscious and nothing else. We're just glad that people
are there absorbing the light and energy. It's working as long as they
show up i think."
Posted to t.d.n: 05/03/97 00:03:18