I'm three albums in and I don't get it. I've seen the band being lauded for having complex and experimental pieces, but I just don't see it. It sounds very run of the mill for me. I don't think their sound is any weird or abrasive either. So, what is it, Yea Forums? What's so good about TOOL?
What's the appeal of TOOL?
Ryder Price
Other urls found in this thread:
en.wikipedia.org
twitter.com
Aaron Reyes
tool is not music
it's a higher plain of existence.
Cooper Ross
It can be hard to notice, but they often use lots of polymetres, polyrythyms and base their lyrical choice, song structure and rythyms around each other making a strangely and otherworldly complex nature
Logan Edwards
they have a few time signature changes in their songs so that makes people think that they are this ultra avant garde group for some reason
Grayson Robinson
>experimental
>weird
>abrasive
Tell me how I know you frequent reddit and are subscribed to Theneedledrop?
Eli Clark
its soft rock palatable metal , its relaxing and not jarring metal to listen to stoned
Blake Wilson
There's nothing "so good" about Tool if you don't enjoy that sort of music.
Personally, I like their songs. They sound nice to me.
Lucas Moore
If you like counting out time signatures they're pretty fun. Usually nothing crazy but far more complex in the polymetre and polyrhythm department than the vast majority of popular bands.
Caleb Clark
So what you're saying is that it is ultimately about the experience? The music itself is not really complex, but there's a bunch of small factors that contribute to this perception of Tool as a weird and experimental band?
Yeah, that's the impression I got from their first three albums.
Nope and nope. I'm just repeating the terms I see used to describe the band both here on Yea Forums and by two friends that are great fans of them.
Justin Gutierrez
Is that enough to make an artist interesting, though?
Camden Lewis
Sorry, the first response was meant for
Carter Turner
well the music IS fairly complex depending on your threshold for time signature fuckery. yeah if you're a big fan of cutting edge jazz fusion sort of stuff (looking at you adam neely) then maybe alternating 7/8 8/8 9/8 measures isn't that crazy but the creativity behind the songs and how they're written is pretty impressive. honestly i think the thing that makes tool kind of hard to get into is their muddy sound. fans love it, but i feel like it kind of buries the complexity in a wash of dirty unclear tones. the new album apparently has multiple 20 minute long songs so im psyched for that. also OP i think you'll like 10,000 days the most, its my favorite as well
Joseph White
> it kind of buries the complexity in a wash of dirty unclear tones
Yeah, I think that might be a big contributing factor. I don't think switching between tempos is a merit per se, it has to benefit the music or the themes somehow. And it becomes really hard to judge if it does contribute to the composition when the production is so compressed. Thanks for the response, I'll try to keep this in mind when I'm listening to 10,000 Days.
Luis Powell
>it has to benefit the music or the themes somehow
well thats the entire point of doing it on lateralus
en.wikipedia.org
Kayden Diaz
I don't know if the Wikipedia page makes the song justice, but reading through that it just seems the band crammed a bunch of faux intellectual stuff in it as they could. Alchemy? Emerald Tablet? And the Fibonacci sequence is just so commonplace for anyone trying to put on a mystical and esoteric façade.
How is the song improved by having its verses follow the Fibonacci sequence? Does it sound better for it? Or is it just a cool little trinket they employed without much meaning?
John Campbell
Over thinking, over analyzing separates the body from the mind
Michael Torres
Is this good? Do I want to separate the body from the mind? Or is it a mistake?
Jeremiah Price
Its one of those bands druggies and kids like because they think theyre smart and it idolises the church of psychedelia. Maynard is a literal faggot and tripping balls doesnt reveal the secrets of the universe.
Aiden Cruz
Are you listening to it on weed? And no, not just a little bit. I'm talking a heaping amount after a tolerance break. The tolerance break should be long enough to the point where you "forget" how music sounds on weed versus sober. If you're smoking weed and listening to music regularly it is NOT the same; you get used to it.
Have you listened to one of their albums, front to back, while you're peaking/high-plateauing on a tryptamine?
Don't judge them until you've gone around the block with them drug wise.
Michael Hernandez
Can't say I did. But I gotta say, I love how this comment came right after lol
Bentley Perez
they song is about overanalysis. they put those things in there as an homage to overthinking about the intent of art and how it puts us out of touch with reality. so they put all these silly complex things in there as a tongue in cheek sort of gesture. and the song sounds cool as fuck so yes, the song is improved by them.
Hudson Perry
That's kinda cool.