The Tool Page: Opinion - View Single Post - 2007/01/31 - Melbourne, AUS

Just thought I'd sneak this in before this thread gets locked

http://www.beat.com.au/review.php?id=511

Quote:

Tool
Myer Music Bowl

Let’s get something straight. It hurts to write this.

Tool are one of my fave bands, 10,000 Days my album of 2006, and like many, I was highfiving my mates for weeks in the lead-up to this show. Tool. The Myer Music Bowl. Gold tickets. I was pumped. And no doubt, so too were the line of 11,500 black Tool t-shirts that circumvented the Tan, all queuing patiently to get in.

So how was it? How was the gig of the year, by the best band in the world?

Disappointing, is one word. Underwhelming, is the other.

For a start, what’s Maynard’s problem? Have people been telling him he’s God for so long now he’s started to believe it, or is it an acute case of little-man syndrome? Must be. Even after witnessing his dismissive superior air at the Big Day Out performance, and knowing his reputation for being ‘difficult’, still nothing prepared me for his refusal to engage with a devoted audience, his lack of communication, and the fact he comes across like an complete arrogant wanker onstage. Where was the energy? The presence? The charisma from their frontman? Weren’t Tool here to give us something back?

“Waddup?” sneers the singer to the 11,500 Tool fans who have payed over $100 (and let’s be honest, many paid a lot more on eBay) to see his band, as the four of them take the stage. Waddup, you say?

And so it goes. This middle-aged pot-bellied scrawny little man, with his cowboy hat and scraggly Mohawk, puts on the most introverted half-hearted performance I have ever seen from a band of their stature. Indeed, the term ‘frontman’, does not even apply in his case. His stage show limited itself to flailing like some drunken goblin whilst silhouetted against the picture screens, and sometimes singing. How well he sang exactly is debatable, his voice so buried in the guitar-heavy mix. And yes, Tool are a band where the vocals are lower in the mix than your conventional act. Regardless, for most of the show his voice was inaudible. When it was meant to soar, it didn’t, and so the crowd carried the tune for him.

Nonetheless, the gig had its moments. This is Tool, after all, so even if they were just going through the motions, no other band in the world even comes close to what they do. The band was tight, the sound monolithic, the playing above reproach. You could argue it was all worth it just to see drummer Danny Carey play. The man is an octopus. The virtuoso of percussion. Likewise, Justin Chancellor seemed to be genuinely enjoying himself, dropping his shoulder into the muscular basslines that give spine to Tool’s polyrhythmic songs, and while guitarist Adam Jones simply stood with a glazed expression for the entire show, he nonetheless executed every riff to perfection. Sledgehammer renditions of Jambi, with its spine-tingling talk-box solo, and Vicarious were truly awesome to witness live. However perfunctory the performances, Tool will always do enough to raise the hairs on the back of your arms.

But now to my other main quibble. The setlist! Sure, it was great to hear Stinkfist and 46&2 from Aenema, and as expected Parabola and the title track from Lateralus… but that was it! Apart from the dubious inclusion of an overly long Rosetta Stoned (arguably 10,000 Days’ most tuneless track), we were treated to boring interludes, and over 20 minutes of the dirge-like Wings For Marie I & II. Okay, okay, to the diehards who want to say this was ‘dynamics’ and part of the band’s psychedelic manifesto, you’re kidding yourselves. Did you come for a rock show, or to watch the outline of Maynard huddled over a keyboard warbling Tibetan cantors while the band tinker minimal atmospherics? To add insult to injury, the four of them abandoned their instruments for another five minutes and went and sat down on the drum riser to allow the crowd to bask them in lighter-held-high glory. What the fuck was that? The assembled Tool Army came for the songs, the anthems, a fucking concert! Not this self-indulgent dribble. And where the hell was the The Grudge? Or Ticks&Leeches? Even The Pot – undoubtedly the pick off the new album, a song clearly everyone wanted to hear, a song that Maynard refused to play in Sydney, a song begrudgingly trotted out at the Melbourne Big Day Out – was not played. These and many, many more of Tool’s great songs were simply ignored.

I suspect many of us have been guilty of looking at Tool through rose-coloured 3D glasses for too long. For those who allowed themselves to be stung for a $45 t-shirt prior the show, I bet you’re kicking yourself now. The roar of the crowd that followed the band’s group huddle at the end of their show was equal parts incredulousness as it was appreciation. Surely that can’t be it, seemed to be the consensus. They say every great band should leave you wanting more, but in this case a fair proportion of the crowd would have left feeling short-changed. Sorry, fellas, but a pretty laser show and some picture screens alone don’t make a great gig. Let’s hope when you return in November/December, you’ll give the fans what they want.

Oh, and thank you, Maynard. It’s now clear how the band arrived at their name.

NICK SNELLING

Does Nick lurk or post here? Interesting that he echoes what a lot have said on tn.
Also FWIW InPress gave this show an excellent review.