most of their albums have a weird noise at the beginning. What's sweat? Is it just some kind of phased sample? Intolerance has that water sound. It has to be water, and the oxygen tank makes sense. I don't think it's a bong hit anymore, you could EQ a bong hit to sound like that, but you'd be EQing it specifically to sound like something else. Stinkfist has that weird ass drum machine which I wish someone would explain to me- they never use that sound live. What could they have possibly done in the studio that they can't replicate live? You could count the Timothy Leary samples at the beginning of Salival/Third Eye as continuing the trend. The Grudge has what sounds like a garbage truck or something to me (can anyone explain the significance of the sound and what it actually is?). But Vicarious kicks right off. I wonder why they didn't continue the trend.

Ever heard of change?

This has been brought up many times before.

Some believe that the opening riff is the intro sound or the "alarm clock" ring is that intro. Others, like Inner_Eulogy, believe that it doesn't really matter. I say: either way.

Also, I'm pretty sure that the intro sound on The Grudge is an elevator (which makes sense with the "Saturn ascends" line). Look on The Grudge threads for more info.

danny has a sample of stinkfist that he uses at the end of the extended breakdown when they play it live

I didn't really mean to dismiss his thoughts, but I suppose I came across in a rude manner. I've been trying to work on that very hard. Any how, I completely see the point behind posing the question. I guess my personal opinion is as you said, it doesn't matter to me. Tool's music tops them all and I'm just dandy whether they have a sound at the start of an album or not.

It has always seemed to me that this song/album starts rather abruptly, almost on the half beat.

Maybe this is a result of them trimming it up a bit to be an exact length of 7:06?

It's not a sample in the way that it seems you're interpreting it. Danny is actually playing all of those notes on his mandalas. They are digital samples BUT he is actually playing/manipulating them with the mandalas in the way he'd play whatever those are if they were actually there.

Every once in a while he uses them at the end of the song too, as it's fading out. I can't recall a time when he played that at the very beginning of the song though.

oh that's cool, i don't know much about drums so i was just assuming

Am I the only one who thinks the opening to "Vicarious" sounds like a lullaby (everything before the "alarm clock" flanger bell sound)?

I'm saying this besides the fact that it resembles "Schism" and "The Patient". In other words, ALL THAT ASIDE the intro sounds like a lullaby to me.

maybe they are doing it every two albums? undertow-lateralus (and opiate) with weird, quiet sounds as an intro, aenima and 10,000 days with no funky sounds. i dont count aenima to have a weird sound because the intro one is not like the ones on opiate/undertow/laterulalisnes.

but thats what i think anyway...

Check out a bootleg some time :)