From: Shift619@aol.com

Tool with Failure and Inch
SOMA Live
October 18, 1996

If you were looking for musical intensity and didn't attend this Tool 
concert, then you missed out. Big time. Playing just the second date of a 
new tour celebrating the release of their third and latest release, 
"Aenima," Tool delivered a stunning and powerful display of elaborate, 
multi-faceted hard rock.
Following opening acts Inch (voted the top alternative band in the 1996 
San Diego Music Awards) which gave a melodic, Husker-Du-esque 
performance, and the very guitar-laden, yet oddly poppy Failure, Tool let 
the crowd warm up by dimming the lights and playing a loop of synthesized 
sounds. When they appeared five minutes later, Tool wasted no time 
ripping into an arresting version of "Stinkfist," the first single off 
the new album. What quickly became apparent was how magnificently Tool 
replicated their songs from the album, yet at the same time added so much 
punch to the mix. 
Fronted by bald and bare-chested lead singer Maynard James Keenan, Tool 
focused almost exclusively on material from their exceptional new album. 

Along with drummer Danny Carey, new bass player Justin Chancellor, and 
lead guitarist Adam Jones, Keenan roamed the stage with a strange, 
staring presence. His vocals, while not among the most powerful, are 
distinguished by a higher range and razor sharp pitch which is a great 
compliment to the often heavy, driving foundation of their music. Tool 
exhibited new and expanded dimensions as evidenced by the songs "H." and 
"Useful Idiot," which displayed a somewhat mystical, Eastern percussive 
ambiance not heard from this band before.
Proceeding with machine gun-like precision, they perfectly delivered 
"Eulogy," "jimmy," and "Hooker with a Penis" from "Aenima," before 
playing the crowd, radio, and MTV favorite "Sober" from their second 
album, "Undertow." They closed the show with the title track from the new 
release in a fitting end to one of the most penetrating and brilliant 
concerts to come to San Diego recently.

[This review was written by Scot Tempesta and was published in SLAMM on 
11/6/96.]

Jeremy
shift619@aol.com