page: 36
 title: Tool  Kicking against the pricks
author: Robyn Doreian

Maynard James Keenan is adept at side-stepping personal 
questions, but once the conversation turns to politics, 
psychology, spirituality, art and music, he is more than happy 
to share his experience, as Rock Sound discovers.

Maynard James Keenan is an intensely private person. While 
the Tool frontman is known for being outspoken about issues 
such as cencorship and got banned from American radio for 
his anti-Bush sentiments, he clams up when the subject 
matter is of a more personal nature.
Questions designed to glean details about the vocalist's 
living arrangements are met with the steadfast response,"I 
am not going into that. That is my personal life," as the 
conversation comes to a screeching halt. What does however 
open his cerebral clam is Keenan's passion for art, music, 
spirituality and psychology. When the conversation shifts to 
religon, the government and the horror of compromised 
integrety, he is positively verbose. As an artist, Keenan views 
it as his responsebility to speak out against the forces that 
seek to oppress him.
When Tool formed in 1991, the art-rockers defined their 
ideals as, "developing conciousness and figuring out our 
place in this world as consious beings". Eleven years later, 
Keenan continues to spread the word about both.

RS: During Tool's live show, you tell the audience "art saves 
lives". Under what circumstance did it save yours?
MJK: As a child, some things happen and they might damage 
you in some way and that can make you see the world in a 
strange light. If you allow that damage to run your life, you 
could end up being a guy on a building with a rifle- or you 
could channel your damage int a different way and become a 
sculptor instead. Art provided me with a creative outlet.

RS: How did your interest in Jungian psychology come about?
MJK: It was during my psychology class at art school that the 
instructor got us all to read The Hero With A Thousant Faces 
by Joseph Campbell. In that book he relates the myth of the 
hero to religions around the world. Having been brought up a 
Southern Baptist and having rejected that fairytale, I was very 
interested in finding out that a lot of these stories had 
connections to other stories from other cultures around the 
world. It made it bigger for me to understand. With the work 
of Carl Jung, my interest is in terms of human development, 
both globally and individually.

RS:Has your interest in psychology extended to undertaking 
therapy yourself?
MJK: The therapy I have undertaken is to dive into a room 
with three other very strong-willed individuals and see where 
we can meet in the middle. In that situation we can see how 
well we can listen to each other.

RS: Under what circumstances do you think you have made 
the greatest discoveries about yourself?
MJK: In the process of letting go of preconcieved notions.

RS: What areas of spirituality have you delved into to explore 
your own conciousness?
MJK: All of it. Take all of them, as there is truth in every 
religion. You just have to weed out the middleman principle, 
the profit portion, and just get to the crux of it.

RS:Have you come to any conclusions as to why we are here?
MJK: No, but I think we are here to create a New World Order. 
George Bush is an extremely evil person and what he is 
doing is bringing us down. He is making it very difficult to 
travel around the world because I am an American, and 
people will look at me in exactly the same way they used to 
look at the Germans when tey were travelling back in the 
1950's. We are living in McCartyism, the Third Reich and 
people don't realise it.
Look at the events of September 11 and notice who profited 
from that. The person who profited by that was the President 
of the United States who was not elected by the people but 
by a fault in the electoral system. His public opinion was at 
an all-time low, so he benefited from it. His family's oil, war 
and weapons interests all benefited because everyone was so 
scared that they willingly gave up their civil rights so that if 
anyone discovers how evil this guy is, they can't do anything 
about it.
It really amazes me that the American people are just blindly 
letting this go on. Thy are not even considering the possibility 
that their government could be lying to them. It is absolutely 
nauseating.

RS:How Did Tool get Banned from American radio?
MJK: We were on tour in America when the events of 
September 11 took place and I talked about global healing, 
and immediately a bunch of thugs in the front row starded 
chanting, 'USA", I said that they should hang on to that for a 
second until we figure out what we did wrong, and then we got 
banned.
The song 'Schism' is very significant for me. It came out a 
month before September 11 and the second verse says, 'I 
know the pieces fit cuz I watched them tumble down/no fault 
none to blame it doesn't mean I don't desire to point the 
finger/blame the other/watch the temple temple over. To 
bring the pieces back together, rediscover communication.' 
When Tool was on the brink of breaking up, it was our ability 
to communicate with each other that saved us.

RS: How do you think your religious upbringing has impacted 
on who you are today?
MJK: The religious upbringing that most peolpe go through 
and its association with Western religion is all based on lies. 
At some point you either wake up and realise they are lies or 
you continue in a fog, and I realised I had been lied to and 
wanted to know the truth. There is a big difference between 
religion and spirituality. If you are walking a spiritual path, it 
is because you are trying to help others or yourself for the 
greater good. You are trying to become a more concious 
being through your actions and by understanding what 
motivates you. Religion is basically a marketing plan. There 
is a middleman involved and somewhere along the line, 
someone is going to ask for your credit card number. They 
are going to pass a plate in front of you, trick you into giving 
10% of your income to some child-molesting fuckhead, ask 
for money, or worse - trick you into giving up your civil rights 
over some story book.

RS: Why do you think people still subscribe to it?
MJK: I am still trying to figure thet out.

RS: In line with concepts of Jungian-psychology, what do you 
think it means to be human in 2002?
MJK: long pause… It feels like we are on the brink of 
something here. It almost feels like we are going to have to 
figure out our connection to each other or we are not going to 
survive as a race.

RS: Therein lies a great opportunity.
MJK: A great opportunity for liars, thieves and murderers like 
our government. This so-called New World Order has been 
very effective in undermining the creative process to the point 
where it is run by actors and businessmen with marketing 
plans. It is no longer about music. I mean, when is the last 
time you had three CDs come across your desk in a month 
that really impressed you?
Now it's like one every six months.

RS: In what ways do you feel you are being undermined?
MJK: Basically because of money and power. I know very 
creative people who are considering putting their process on 
the back burner so that they can make some money with 
some horrible, horrible band with no artistic integrity. What 
they don’t realise is that as soon as they do that, that band 
will use their name to undermine anything they could possibly 
do in the future with any credibility. They are completely 
selling out their credibility for the money. It happens at so 
many levels here that people pretty muchaccept it as the 
process and it has completely underminded everything.

RS: But what do you do when you are a struggling artist? 
MJK: Figure a way. Realise that you don’t need your DVD 
player. Laughs. Start from the basics of what it is going to 
take you to survive. You need a roof over your head, food  
and clothes. Just start there. Everything else should go into 
your art. I was sleeping on adam Jones, guitarist’s floor when 
we started this band.

RS: The formative years of Tool have always been portrayed 
as all four members having solid careers, bereft of any 
financial struggle. 
MJK: That was kind of the case, but when the band started, 
Adam had a decent job, but he didn’t have a decent job as 
he was focused on his art. He was trying to pay to go to 
special effects school and playing his guitar on the side. 
When the band started in Los Angeles, yeah, he had a 
decent job, but he struggled to get to that moment when it 
all worked out. Danny Carey moved out here from Kansas 
City and lived in a barn so that he could play drums. He 
finally got a job running around town doing something, but it 
took him years to get it and year to get to that point, and I 
was working like a slave on video sets.

RS: Are the costumes you wear on stage ,wigs, Speedo 
bathers, being seates in a wheelchair, purely for the benefit 
of the audience or do they transform you into someone 
different every night?
MJK: There is a story back in the day when Michael Keaton 
was contemplating playing Batman and wondering how he was 
going to do it. He was sitting with Jack Nicholsonwho 
said, “sometimes you have to let the costume do the acting 
for you’. That is kind of where I’m at with that.

RS: Is it something you plan in advance?
MJK: Not really. The ideas come from the music and you do it 
either and it either works or it doesn’t, in wich case you 
abandon it  and go to the next thing.

RS: Have any of them not worked?
MJK: Oh plenty. I don’t want to bring them up, but there is 
photo evidence.

RS: How does it feel wearing prosthetic breasts?
MJK: Who says they are fake?  Laughs

RS: What boundaries did you set for yourself regarding your 
involvement with a perfect circle in relation to your 
commitments to Tool?
MJK: I don’t set boundaries. People can’t get it through their 
heads heads that a perfect circle is not a side-project. It is 
like having two children and saying that you just thought you 
would have the second one for fun. No, they are your children 
and part of your life. We are writing at present and there 
should be another album out next year. 

RS: What is happening with the tapeworm project you were 
working on with Trent Reznor?
MJK: Until you have actually heard a song, it didn’t happen. I 
have written it off. It is not going to come out it never 
happened.

RS: You made your acting debut in the internet-only-release 
film Bikini Bandits Go To Hell, where you starred as Satan. Is 
acting something you are keen to pursue?
MJK: It wasn’t really an acting project, it was just a bunch of 
friends coming together and messing around. I think all 
musicians get interested in acting and all actors get 
interested in music. Bad idea.

RS: When will there be a new Tool album?
MJK: In a couple of years’ time.

RS: Tool’s live shows are a unique sensory experience. What 
do you think it is that sets them apart from other live acts?
MJK: We are totally at odds with the current musical climate. 
Do you really think people are impressed by Nickelback? Or 
Limp Dickshit? How could you be impressed by Fred Durst? 
When they come to see something that has more substance, 
it is a moving experience as there is heart. There is intent. 
What they see moves them, it would have to. Going to see 
Nirvana, Nine Inch Nails or Rage Against the Machine, there is 
heart. It breathes. You have to be affected by that.

Posted to t.d.n: 02/08/04 06:36:52