Album Investigation

Thirteen years in the making, Tool finally released the album Fear Inoculum on August thirtieth twenty nineteen, the long awaited new release that fans had been waiting for. There was radio silence for a few years after the release of their album 10,000 Days, and only some small information that a few of the band members were working on instrumental pieces. Maynard James Keenan, the front man of Tool had gone off to work on a side project, a band by the name of Pucifer. In two thousand and eight , Keenan had made an announcement that Tool was beginning to seriously work on their next album, thus giving the fans some much needed tidbits of information on whether or not Tool would rise again. Amidst many years of slowed progress due to physical injuries by accident to a few members of the band, eventually the album started to get worked on.   Progress slowed due to these injuries, setting them back a few sessions of recording and planning. Though Keenan explained that even with those setbacks, the album was still only a half baked plan of ideas and riffs. Progress slowed even further when a lawsuit cropped up based on the artwork that had been used in a prior album, slowing them down even further. It took a year for the legal battles to finalize, but by then it was said that only one track had been labeled as completed. With both home life responsibilities, legal battles and medical issues, the album seemed to be taking much longer than it should have. By twenty fifteen, Tool began to tour once more but decided this was the perfect time to play their track “Descending,”, though according to one of the band members it was a crunched together version that would not represent the entire song. Fans went wild for the new track as they now had a long awaited update to the one they had received all the way back in two thousand and eight.  

By this time, the band explained that most of the instrumentals had been completed and they were now in the writing process of the work, passing on the buck to Keenan to finalize. Though even a year later, the band explained that even with most the instrumentals done, they still were fine tuning them as they went, not wanting to call the album “done” in any manner of speaking. The band members, besides Keenan, had expressed wanting to, or at least hoping to get the album out to the public by twenty eighteen. However, Keenan expressed a different opinion as he believed it would be much later than that. Keenan was also working on another album for his band A Perfect Circle, which released another album early twenty eighteen. Giving the impression that his work was split between the two projects, thus why it would take a longer time to finish Fear Inoculum. Keenan even expressed that he had only just received the final instrumentals for the album and had since begun working on lyrics and and melodies for the vocals.  

Finally, with the release of Fear Inoculum in August of twenty nineteen, Tool released their long awaited album to their fans. With the release Keenan made a statement about the length of time it had taken to complete this project, believing that along side the family life, accidents and financial issues that cropped up during the creation of the album, but that second guessing by the band was the biggest impediment to the albums release. Keenan however believes that even if they had released earlier, with the experimental instrumentals they had created in the initial draft of the album, it would have been just as good as it came out then. 

With the album released, fans flocked to stores to purchase their own copy of Fear Inoculum. The fan base as said before, had been waiting years for this album to drop, endlessly re-listening to to the bands older and side albums. Having stemmed from the political and social commentary of their older music, Tool only strayed slightly from the path of outer reflection and more to the inner reflection. Keenan explained that when he was writing this album, he wanted to make something that delved into the idea of growing older, but wiser. This concept is not an unknown topic among the fan base, the Prog Rock community, as much of the music made under this genre tended to be such. 

Thus, Fear Inoculum was taken well by the fans and critics alike. Critics gave the album a very positive review, receiving many perfect scores and high scores from critics such as Metacritic at an 81 of 100, and higher reviews from over 23 other critics. Having been labeled with universal acclaim, the album was seen as doing very well with both the fans and critics as a whole. Keenan was even given comment that this album represented some of the best vocals to come out of Tool, or even the best across Keenan’s musical career. 

The album went on to win 2 Grammy Awards, one for best metal performance, and Best Rock Song. However, they were not without their more negative reviews, a few critics noting problems with the very long winded, almost eighty minute album. The album was described as overworked, long winded and under-cooked, as though the band had taken too long and worked to much on trying to refine it. 

As Keenan had said, Fear Inoculum was an album that had been created based on the concept of growing older and wiser. As uncanny as it was, the album taking as long as it did, while speaking to the ideas of years and wisdom, he wanted it to say something that everyone could learn from. The album, from start to finish, is an attempt to inspire knowledge and thought in the listener. He wanted us to understand us as people and individuals in the current, the present, the now of ourselves. This way, we understand why we had gone through what we did, and where we came from in order to know why we are the way we are now. Keenan described it as a slowly developed movie, something we must stop and re-watch in order to understand how we got to where we were. He said it was almost a requirement to listen to the album multiple times in order to get an understanding of the meaning of the songs. 

This isn’t the band’s first foray into music with deeper meanings, almost all of their songs, even instrumental ones, were supposed to pull a thoughtful moment from the listener. From the album 10,000 Days, written because of the death of Keenan’s mother, to the album Undertow and the cycle of abuse and acceptance. The band had never been afraid to talk about any and all topics they felt strongly about, and still work this way to this day. As a piece of art, music is meant to grab you and pull you into a moment where the writer of said music is trying to lead you to learn and grow from what they know.

Having only come out eight months ago, the album has barely begun it’s time on influencing fans. I myself have listened to the bands older albums for well over twenty years, and still have impacts on my musical mind that come directly from listening to those songs. There is yet to be known how this album will come to effect the Tool fans of today, each listener having to take their time with the lengthy and cryptic lyrics of the songs.