Tool frontman reveals why ‘Fear Inoculum’ took 13 years to drop

All anyone has been talking about lately is Tool, and for good reason. 

The band finally released their highly-anticipated album Fear Inoculum, which is the band’s first record in 13 years. 

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As if that wasn’t enough news, they recently put all of their music videos on YouTube for the first time and announced an upcoming tour. 

The album has lived up to its hype, but frontman Maynard James Keenan has revealed that he was pretty stressed leading up to the whole thing. 

Keenan spoke to BBC Radio 1’s Rock Show about why the band waited so long to drop another album and the fear that came with that. 

“You want it to be right and we’ve had some success in the past, and the fear of this thing coming out and not being accepted – the fear that it’s not as good as it can be – that can be detrimentally crippling,” he said.

“Probably if I had to ‘psychology 101’ (it), I would have to say ‘Well yeah, that’s why it would take 13 years to write something, because you’re paranoid that it’s not gonna be the best that it can be.’ Then you second-guess every single step that you make, when it was probably good enough – I shouldn’t say good enough – it was fantastic eight years ago.” 

He then went on to discuss how he got over that fear to finally share the album with the world.

“But then the crippling second-guessing of yourself sets in, and that psychology and that spiral you get in, it can be extremely daunting. And you can actually not even feel it happening,” he continued. “All of a sudden you wake up and it’s thirteen years later. The hard part is accepting the fact that maybe you’re not nearly as important as you think you are and you should probably just get on with it.”

He also discussed Tool recently embracing the internet, and said the new album being on iTunes is “pretty much the seventh seal of hell breaking open”. 

“I think the hard part with bands like ours that want to control every element of everything; they forget that all you needed to control was the writing and recording. Once that thing’s done, let other people do what they do with it,” he said. “iTunes is just another record store. Amazon Music is just another record store. Everything you did is done, you did it.”

You can listen to Fear Inoculum below and read a review on the album here. Also, you can check out the band’s recently-announced tour dates as well. 

Tool Dates

10/13 — Sacramento, CA @ Aftershock Festival
10/15 — Denver, CO @ Pepsi Center
10/18 — Salt Lake City, UT @ Vivint Smart Home Arena
10/20 — Los Angeles, CA @ Staples Center
10/21 — Los Angeles, CA @ Staples Center
10/23 — Glendale, AZ @ Gila River Arena
10/25 — San Antonio, TX @ AT&T Center
10/27 — Houston, TX @ Toyota Center
10/29 — Tulsa, OK @ BOK Center
10/31 — Milwaukee, WI @ Fiserv Forum

11/02 — Indianapolis, IN @ Banker’s Life Fieldhouse
11/03 — Chicago, IL @ United Center
11/05 — Cincinnati, OH @ US Bank Arena
11/06 — Cleveland, OH @ Rocket Mortgage Fieldhouse
11/08 — Pittsburgh, PA @ PPG Paints Arena
11/09 — Detroit, MI @ Little Caesars Arena
11/11 — Toronto, ON @ Scotiabank Arena
11/12 — Toronto, ON @ Scotiabank Arena

11/14 — Boston, MA @ TD Garden
11/16 — Newark, NJ @ Prudential Center
11/18 — Philadelphia, PA @ Wells Fargo Center
11/19 — Brooklyn, NY @ Barclay’s Center
11/21 — Uncasville, CT @ Mohegan Sun Casino Arena
11/22 — Atlantic City, NJ @ Boardwalk Hall
11/24 — Raleigh, NC @ PNC Arena
11/25 — Washington, DC @ Capitol One Arena

What do you think of how Tool felt prior to dropping the album? Sound off in the comments down below!

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