Maynard James Keenan.

A bookmark here.  As I’ve lately listened to Tool more and more, on the strength of my recent awakening, it’s almost impossible not to wonder about Maynard James Keenan’s creative process.  I mean hell, just from listening to the music, it’s obvious that this is not a typical front man;  aside from the content itself of what he sings and how–which I’d argue is self-evidently interesting on its own–the sheer, raw range of his delivery, mood, emotion, texture, and the creativity in orchestrating it all…well, this seems like someone who may have a creative process that is interesting in and of itself.  (You know, for someone who appreciates the art in…well, everything.)

And I have already picked up a little bit about his process–such as that with Tool and A Perfect Circle, he only starts adding lyric and vocal content after the music, written by others, is complete;  things like that.  So, I figured the next step would be to see if I could see or hear him present himself, in an interview, etc.  And I’ve now seen a couple such clips.

Oh boy.  Yeah, sometimes the gut feeling is the correct one.  This is an interesting person, and it doesn’t take long to see that what you get, in Tool, APC, Puscifer, etc., springs very directly and honestly from the man behind it.  As just one illustrative example, it seems that the reason he doesn’t begin work on lyric or vocal content until he can hear the music that will present it…is because to do otherwise just won’t work.  Shoehorning an existing lyric onto existing music, is not the same as discovering a lyric already present but hidden in the music.  (And personally, I totally identify with that.  I’ve long wondered, as goes the traditional process of naming human babies:  how is it possible to give a name to a living being you haven’t even met yet?  I see the same impulse here, the same need for authenticity.)  And this also explains much about how Keenan drapes his voice over the music in such an unconventional way…

And the overall way he answers questions and presents himself, strikes me as densely full of little nuggets and observations like this, going way beyond music and even all the other myriad things the man does and has done.  You quickly get a remarkably clear picture of an artist-perfectionist who is at once uninterested in the mediocre, yet fascinated with the authentic no matter how ordinary.  Some may see a contradiction in that, but I sure don’t.

This clip is an interesting overview, and worth the bookmark:

There is also “The Art of Work” four-part series, which begins here;  it’s quite illustrative.  This one is an audio interview (ironically the audio is terrible) which also reveals much, and I just loved this interview, if for no other reason than his take on his much-publicized use of the Fibonacci sequence in allocating the syllabic structure of the verses in Tool’s “Lateralus”.

“…in general, music IS the phi ratio…it’s already here…by pointing it out;  [by] staring at it, and pointing at it with those numbers…it’s good to let people know about it…but I almost feel like it was kind of a…it was kind of a dick joke, in a way…I could do better.”

Somehow, given the way his personality comes through with such apparent consistency across everything I’ve seen thus far, I don’t doubt he’s being quite honest about that.

And that’s awesome.

UPDATE 4/26:  By chance, I ran across this clip of Keenan delivering what must be a speech to potential investors for his winery, Caduceus Cellars.

The mixing of the background music is frequently irritating (to me anyway–it’s mixed way too loud against the ambient reverb of Keenan’s voice, and obscures his words pretty regularly throughout) but the content seems very illustrative of Keenan’s attitude.  It is–thus, I’d add–an outstanding compact manifesto for any artist who might be hesitant to embrace the unapologetic approach to his, or her, own art.

It seemed important to capture it here, for sharing with anyone* who needs reassurance that it can be done, and how to explain why.

 

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* Just to be real clear about this, although you’d probably be able to figure it out on your own without having to read all that much of my vomitus to see it:  “Anyone”, here, absolutely includes myself.

Supertramp, ‘Child of Vision’.

I seem to go for periods of time where I forget about Supertramp.  Not sure why that is, really, but the upshot is that I get to rediscover the group every so often.  And that is always a gratifying thing.

I’ve always had a soft spot for this band, even back when I was first really starting to take off as a listener;  at the time, I wanted as far away from most pop music as I could possibly manage, and so in a way it seems weird that this music reached me at all.  But it did.  Not all of it, for sure, but much of it is great, and some of it is really great.  I found something to dig into on all the albums I could find at the time (in the end I wound up with everything from 1974’s Crime of the Century through to 1985’s Brother Where You Bound), and of course there are a few favorites.  I love the title track on Crime of the Century, with its brief lyrical observation and then that monster groove.  “Fool’s Overture“, from 1977’s Even in the Quietest Moments… is a wonderful piece of writing, with a magnificent and powerful delivery–as is the lovely title track of that record, with its build-up to that singular moment of harmony (you know the one I’m talking about) that just blasts you back into your chair.

And then there is the closer on 1979’s smash Breakfast In America, “Child of Vision“.

Musically, that one really gets to me.  It grooves as hard as anything you care to name–far more than you’d expect at first glance, for sure–and every time I rediscover Supertramp, it somehow surprises me all over again.  It’s a great example of how a popular group can take some of the popular tropes that usually so grate on my ear, and do them well.  So…as one example, I have long detested the formulaic use of saxophone in most rock music–I find the usual tone, the phrasing, the whole presentation, to sound almost pandering, ponderous, bolted in to where it doesn’t belong, and it nearly always turns me off.  But then there’s Supertramp;  Helliwell usually does a lovely job at making the reeds an actual part of the writing, instead of an afterthought plug-in stunt that will somehow sound cool, you know, just because it’s a saxophone.  I’m also not much for piano grooves, but man, Supertramp has delivered some doozies, most definitely including our current subject.  Electronic keyboards are like a friggin’ minefield for me, but I gotta say that these guys do manage to avoid the worst of the wanky keyboard tones, and somehow use plenty of synth timbres in a way that nearly always actually works.  I find the group’s rhythm section to be consistently interesting and always on point;  when you think of Supertramp you’re not likely to think about how good the drum and bass parts are…but listen again, and tell me that’s not a surprising way beyond merely solid.  And of course there’s Hodgson’s inimitable voice, often juxtaposed against Davies’ to wonderful effect.  (I have to admit that I wanted to like the post-Hodgson Supertramp, especially since it was apparently Davies who wanted more musical experimentation…but the mixture just never took off, for me, without Roger’s influence–the voice, sure, but also the musical influence beyond the voice.  Sigh…such is the nature of a group, sometimes.)

Anyway, bookmarked.  A lovely blast from the past.

Tool: trending in my head.

I came late to the music of Tool.  In a way, I consider this a personal mistake not unlike the way I ignored Iron Maiden for so many years before really listening…but then again, I am also sympathetic to the idea that art has a certain currency in time for each of us, and maybe my time for Tool was exactly right after all.

At this point, I’ll not quibble about that.  It’s difficult to express just how powerful the impact has been.  (Hell, it’s still blooming, with little sign even of leveling off.)

The steamroller first started with Rick Beato’s excellent “What Makes This Song Great” analyses of Schism and Parabol/Parabola, both from the Lateralus album.  I thought I’d create a Pandora station seeded on Tool, but was disappointed to find out that (at that time) there wasn’t any Tool music on the streaming services.  Well, as luck would have it, Santa then gifted me the Lateralus record this last Christmas, and I got to dig in to the full album as properly as I am currently equipped to do.  My expectations were actually pretty high, on the strength of Beato’s commentary and an increasing gut feeling that this was going to be important.

Ha!  Tool simply shattered those expectations, and then kept right on going.

There’s too much to say, and I’ll not even attempt to say it all now, but a couple of thoughts warrant the initial bookmark here.  The best news is that at some point since I first tried, Tool’s music is now available both on streaming services and on YouTube, via their official YouTube channel.  (And so now I have that Pandora station, which has further introduced me to (vocalist) Maynard’s other projects A Perfect Circle and Puscifer, which are proving to be pretty impressive in their own right!)  The exposure to the whole available catalog has made several things very clear…

First, this is a group with a distinct and important muse, which highlights for me something that Robert Fripp somewhat famously said when asked if he could hear the King Crimson influence in Tool.  Fripp said he couldn’t hear the influence in Tool’s music, but after listening both closely and broadly to the whole catalog, I don’t think that’s the right question to ask.  I would say that I absolutely do hear, in Tool, the same ancestral voice that Fripp has discussed as available in Crimson’s influences;  e.g., Bartok, Holst, Hendrix, etc.  Tool’s and Crim’s muses are not the same, certainly, but I think the kinship is real, and is what sets Tool so vastly apart from anyone else who might beg a comparison.

Their history indicates pretty clearly that this is a group that does things on its own terms, and is uninterested in accepting mediocrity from itself.  Man, that’s meaningful to me, and I would argue you can hear it in their work.  They even appear to be getting better with time, rather than hitting a creative peak and then falling off as so often happens with big musical acts.  As stunning as Lateralus is, as an album–Tool makes albums, by god, not mere collections of songs–I think their best work may be the latest one, Fear Inoculum;  obviously this took some time and has some history, but again, once it arrived, it was right.

Finally, the music is rich.  Crushingly rich.  It is obvious that art and craft are unapologetically important to these people, and while listening you can pretty much take your pick of what to focus on.  Each contributor is notably creative about his approach and execution, and can hold a listener’s interest fully–one could go on about Carey’s unique phrasing and orchestration, or Chancellor’s hypnotic riffs, or Jones’ eerie ability to imbue even the simplest palm-mute chugging with a definable personality…and then there is Keenan, with a range of nuance and emotion that is simply surprising, even to repeated listens, in its ability not just to fit within an unusual musical landscape, but actually to take that already-mature landscape to yet further places unattainable without it.  And yet for all that Tool is a group;  all this individual creativity serves the group’s muse first–not a simple trick to pull off!

In the most literal sense of the word, this is interesting music, which can set a hook in you without your realizing it, and then transport you instantly to places beautiful, terrible, peaceful, and chaotic.

One specific thing I find impressive about their writing is the exquisite sense of balance between the simple and the complex.  In many cases, Tool’s music is not particularly complex harmonically, but is layered and rich rhythmically, and with a quality of production and palpably living tone that somehow exposes the nuance in the simple.  And the music is patient, which I would argue is what makes the famous moods so intense, and also is what makes it possible to see the larger canvas on which it all fits.

Really, Tool hits firmly on pretty much all the things that the best art is capable of achieving.  The craft is undeniable, the art is obvious, and the authenticity is nearly overwhelming, to those who make themselves available to it.

I suspect there’ll be more on these pages, but it’ll probably be more specific.  For an initial effort, it seemed to make more sense to speak to the biggest things first.

The LEGO guitar fingerboard.

Bookmark, bookmark, bookmark.  This is the coolest thing I’ve seen in a good while (thank you Nathan!):

I’ll have to cogitate a bit on the idea, and may have to see about getting me one, because that’s just awesome.