If there were a prize given to the biggest anonymous band around, Tool just might be in the running for the award. The four-piece band fills arenas and sells plenty of CDs.
Yet compared to its ’90s-based contemporaries like the instantly recognizable Green Day and No Doubt, the band is shrouded in relative mystery. Vocalist Maynard James Keenan would figure to be the “face” of the band. But you won’t find his mug or any of the band member’s faces peering out from the cover of many music publications, much less People> magazine.
Tool artwork and album covers also reject the personal in favor of images that are dark and darkly symbolic. Its CD booklets are also bare bones: no printed lyrics or any thank you messages or dedications.
In an era where just about everything is marketed and even talentless heiresses become pop culture icons, it’s refreshing to see a band that actually lets its music do the vast majority of its talking.
At the first of its two Staples Center concerts last week, Tool was true to its usually reticent self. Keenan uttered all of about three lines the entire night. These were essentially polite and brief acknowledgements of the boisterous fan support that greeted the group at the cavernous home of the Lakers, Clippers and Kings.
The Tool clearly reveled in the rare opportunity to celebrate with its heroes. Band albums and tours seem to occur about every five years, which may be another reason why the Los Angeles-bred unit seems to fly under the radar. The infrequent touring may also help sustain the group’s high level of intensity and instrumental prowess.
At the Thursday night Staples Center show, Tool opened with a barrage of songs that were delivered with both jackhammer intensity and a precision befitting a group of highly skilled sonic surgeons.
Tool is probably at its best when its songs are more focused and bursting with high-powered adrenaline. Tunes like the riveting “Vicarious,” from the band’s most recent album “10,000 Days,” and the old favorite “Schism” were taut and transcendent on stage.
Tool isn’t an easy band to pigeonhole, however. The group balances its more straightforward alternative metal with elements of Gothic and art rock. Songs can drift into dark recesses where they brood and simmer. On record, this tendency can occasionally be trying when there is a sense that there is a lack of direction. But live, Tool’s descent into free form melancholia can be quite striking because there exists an almost magical on-stage simpatico among the band’s instrumentalists – guitarist Adam Jones, bassist Justin Chancellor and drummer Danny Carey.
Visually, Keenan is the most gripping of the band members. He struck both a menacing and sexual pose on stage with his mohawk hairstyle, tight jeans and bare chest. Keenan also had an unusual tendency to perform in profile or sometimes with his back to the audience.
When he turned away from the fans, he appeared like a cross between a rock ‘n’ roll stud and a cool jazz musician. His poses and the band’s music were illustrated by apocalyptic video clips, which played against a narrow screen behind the band. The group conjures up mostly troubling images that bring to mind such grim topics as environmental destruction, science gone amok and man’s inhumanity.
Tool provides the perfect soundtrack to a civilization that appears both at its technological peak and in imminent danger of plummeting into an abyss where there is no escape.