Originally Posted by dirtyfeet

This was my first time really hearing Tool & they rocked. I was talking to two "toolphiles" - that's what they called themselves, before the show & they informed me that the set was pretty much the same for the last two tours plus/minus one or two songs. IMHO that is pretty lame. Anyhow, like I wrote they rocked! Standing in a sea of sweaty hippies trying to manage the psychedelics in my body I had an epiphony - Imagine a repeated pattern with very little variation. Perhaps the ticking of a clock. It is so simple and trite that your mind begins to filter it out. The ticking continues and your attention begins to wander. You think about something else, and pretty soon you can't even hear the clock and its incessant, redundant ticking. You crave stimulation. You want life to surprise you. You want life to amuse you. You want to be delighted. You want an alternative. So maybe you turn to drugs, violence, strange sexual practices, prostitution, body modification, extreme sports, pornography, crime. These alternatives are provided for you, within the system. Someone already thought of them many years ago. But you'll do anything to avoid having to listen to that ticking of the clock. You are bored. You cannot sit still. You want to escape. You want a life that is more dangerous and edgy. You don't want life to have a simple answer. You want to feel alive and engaged. You want to rebel and defy the predictable ending to the movie that is your life. So maybe you listen to Tool. They make you feel much better, because the songs that are in 4/4 employ basic syncopation and elementary polyrhythms. He sings through a distortion pedal. The drummer occasionally de-activates his snares so that he will sound more tribal, like a bunch of hippies banging around at a drum circle. There is very little chord movement or harmony. Nevertheless the trance-like state that continued to consume me was indescribeable. Welldone. I only have one complaint - and I can't really do that - is the lack of an evolving setlist. I have travelled with different bands for many years and I just think that the fans going to more than one show deserve to hear a varied setlist. Rock On!!!