TOOL — 10,000 Days (review)

Album · 2006 · Progressive Metal

4.5/5 · 2012-01-05
Doomster

While "Lateralus" is often considered the pinnacle of Tool's career, I personally beg to differ. Don't get me wrong, I do love "Lateralus", but their were a few things that brought it down for me - the overuse of fillers, the debatedly pretensious lyrics, and a few questionable tracks. However, their (unfortunately) least loved album, "10,000 Days" is the first Tool album I can safely call a masterpiece.

Before I begin, however, I feel I should tell about my experience with this band. This might sound really melodramaticv, but Tool are a very important band to me. You could say that they got me into heavy music, or even music, in general. When I was a frail young lad, my dad would occasionally blast "Opiate" or "Aenima" in the car during a long drive at night. I was frightened by their heavy, aggressive and incredibly dark atmosphere they portrayed. To be honest, I used to hate it at the time because of how much it scared me, but as I evolved, so did my love for the band, and music as well. Eventually, I learned to explore various types of music, mainly alt. rock, prog rock, and doom metal. And it was Tool that started it all for me.

So, anyway, about this album. 10,000 Days is Tool's latest (2006) effort. Even though it has now grown to be loved by a majority of Tool fans, it still has recieved heavy controversy and/or debate. It is true that this CD lacks the same atmosphere that albums like "Lateralus" and "Aenima" have, or the aggressiveness, but to be honest, I think that the lack of heaviness (for the main part, at least) is what makes this album obtensibly even more brilliant than past efforts. Tool's heavy songs are always amazing, but they lack the same emotion that conveys the majority of "10,000 Days". Don't get me wrong, though - their are plenty of more heavy moments on this album - it's just that these heavy moments are less angry and more focused on filtering negative emotion than trying to cave your skull in.

The opener, "Vicarious" is one such example the more aggressive moments on the album. An opening song should drag the listener in, and that's exactly what "Vicarious" does. Beginning with a spacey guitar intro, the song refuses to retract it's talons for seven minutes. The lyrics are amazing, and not as "philosiphical" as the lyrics on "Lateralus". In this song, Maynard describes how humans feed off of others misery, as long as it is not happening to them. "We all feed on tragedy, it's like blood to a vampire". "Jambi" is a blazing fast, almost thrash paced track, with a talkbox solo by Adam Jones, and some really beautiful lyrics, which, to me, act as the prelude to the following song.

"Wings For Marie/10,000 Days", the title track, is one of the many Tool songs that I can safely say is a PURE masterpiece. Everything about these two (17 minute) tracks are merely spine-chilling. The lyrics are some of the best ever penned by Maynard, a tribute to his deceased mother. I have admittedly close to crying listening to this track. Supremely beautiful...everyone needs to hear this suite before they die. Perfection.

"The Pot" is a return to the heaviness, but is arguably more controlled than the skull-crushing intensity of the opening two tracks. The song is debatedly Tool's most "mainstream" song, and is a fan favorite. The vocals and guitars play an important part as always, but this one is all about the drums and bass right here! Not my favorite Tool tune, but pretty good.

After a rather pointless but still cool and atmoshperic interlude called "Lipan Conjuring", yet another interlude arises, the four minute "Lost Keys/Blame Hoffman". It is merely a bunch of light feedback, clean riffing, and a discussion for 4 minutes. Unlike the preceeding interlude track, though, it actually has a meaning - the discussion in this song is between a nurse and a doctor, who are talking about a patient who has arrived in the hospital. The two proceed to try and talk to the patient, and after finally getting a word out of him, he begins to tell them his tale...

All of this segues right into place into "Rosetta Stoned", which describes the patient's tale in detail, and is perhaps one of the most disturbing pieces of music concieved by any bands I have ever heard. The song starts off quite humorous, with impossibly funny lyrics and vocal delivery, but then quickly becomes dead serious, the lyrics explaining the patient's LSD trip gone horribly (HORRIBLY) wrong. This song is probably the closest you'll get to hearing new "Aenima" material. Frightening, heavy as hell stuff right here.

After a stronger moment on the album, we are unfortunately introduced to a lesser track that goes by the name of "Intension". It's probably the softest, most atmospheric track on the album - it merely consists of Maynard's half-whispered vocals, a clean but tasteful guitar riff, and some atmospheric bits (as well as a hilarious hidden message in the lyrics). Despite being my least favorite song here, though, it is still rather good, especially in terms of the lyrics, and makes for a very interesting buildup to the following track...

"Right In Two" is the said following track, and is another one of the highlights of this album (and Tool's career, in my opinion), along with "Wings For Marie/10,000 Days". The song starts off really clean, soft, mysterious and even post-rockish sounding, and some amazing lyrics, describing the senseless violence caused by humanity:

"Monkey killing monkey killing monkey Over pieces of the ground. Silly monkeys, give them thumbs, they forge a blade And where there's one you're bound to divide it Right In Two."

The song, like I said, starts off subtle, but then, after a tabla drum solo by Danny Carey, explodes into a massive wall of sound, before dying down again, ending this beautiful crescendo of an album...

...Unfortunately, though, Tool got the idea that it would be good to throw in 5 minutes of noise at the albums and call it "Viginti Tres". It's not a bad filler track by any means, and it also provides a hidden track which could be segued with "Wings For Marie/10,000 Days", but it fails to end the album on the same note that masterpiece "Right In Two" would have.

All in all, despite very very little shaky things, this is, in my opinion, Tool's magnum opus, and is worthy of a 4.50 rating. If you're new to Tool, check out this album first. If you're not convinced, at least just listen to tracks 3 and 4 once - they're really THAT good.

(P.S. 1122 words in this review! That's my record, so far!)