Tool-AEnima (1996)

 


Artist: Tool

Title: AEnima

Label:  Volcano

Format: CD

Cat: 61422-31087-2

Year of Release: 1996

Country and Year of Edition: US 1996, Multi-Image Cover

Sell Price: $5.98 VG+/VG+ 8/18/24

Discogs Last Sold: 8/24/24 VG+/VG+ $6.00

Low: $1.00

Median: $6.00

Average: $6.41

High: $12.00

Current low price: $4.39

Current Number on Sale at Discogs: 22

Have/Want: 1668/421

Where Sold: Williamsburg, VA

Time it took to sell: 3 years

Where and When Purchased: discarded collection

Gwiz-gau Letter Grade: B

Sad To See It Go: No

As I embark on a third listen of Tool's second full length album (third if you count the debut live EP), I'm finding it problematic to say anything about this record.  I managed to ignore the entire Tool catalog after that first live EP until Fear Inoculum came out.  I gave that one an internet listen, liked it and didn't really think about Tool again.  Somebody invited me to their concert a couple years back but rescinded when it was discovered I wasn't a "true fan."  Apparently, no casual Tool observers are allowed.  Fair enough, tickets are expensive in arenas these days.

Well, I've always had mixed feeling about Tool, ever since liking "Jerk-Off" from the Opiate EP and nothing else.  When "Prison Sex" was a big hit, I decided the band kind've sucked and held on to that opinion for 26 years.  Now that I've opened my heart, if not my orifices to Tool, I can declare that the supposed 18th greatest metal record of all time according to Rolling Stone is...well...ok.  

The song that stood out for me on the first listen was the one that stood out every listen, the title track.  I'm not going to bother to find the font that merges the A and the E, but yeah that song I thought was good for the same reason I thought "Jerk-Off" was good.  The exclamative rant at the end.  This time it wraps "Put It Down! Suck It Down Flush It Down!"  With "Jerk-Off" the end was "Shoot It! Kick It! Fuck It" but still has a one-up by ending with the line "Shoot You In The Fucking Head!" to a cheering live audience.  "AEnima" is  a kinder, gentler jerk off.

As for the rest, it's the usual laundry list of post-Cobain Gen-X misery grievances set to tech metal. Since I like this sort of stuff in measured doses, I don't mind this album.  Christgau gave this a bomb rating in his guide and went on to describe a later album as the latest chapter of "meaning-mongering for the fantasy fiction set."  A fancy-pants way of calling Tool's fans NERDS, like Rush fans and Dream Theatre fans and god knows what else.  Then he pooh-poohs King Crimson on top of it, as if to slay the root of the source.  

Well, no, there isn't that "serious musician" Frippertronic element here even if this is tech prog metal with dark themes. It gets light during the "Intermission," a circus-like instrumental plopped in the middle of the 77 minute CD sandwiched between two of the better rocking tracks "Hooker With A Penis" and "Jimmy."

A product of their g-g-generation fer sure.





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