It's no secret that Tool frontman Maynard James Keenan has quite the disdain for fans being on their phones during the band's concerts. During a recent interview with Arizonan newspaper Phoenix New Times, the legendary vocalist opened up on why the idea of fans filming and taking photos while Tool are performing on stage bugs him so much.
"It's rude. Not to us, I mean, I just did a whole photoshoot, I'm not afraid of cameras and I'm not afraid of phones. I've got mine right here. It's a very useful tool. "There's no way you can actually capture what's happening in that live moment on a phone. You're missing the opportunity of actually absorbing in real time what's happening. The art of storytelling. Being able to actually recount what you saw without having to record it."
Maynard also points out that he believes fans being on their phones constantly is also detrimental to not just their experience of the show, but that of the people around them, who have paid to see and absorb the performance.
"Training your brain to live in the moment and see the thing, but more importantly, stop annoying the person behind you. It's annoying, it's distracting and it's distracting for us, too. So put it the fuck away, grow the fuck up. It's only two hours. And at the end of the show, we usually let you film a song, so you get your souvenir."
Keenan also defended the bands habit of banning phone usage at the show and removing people who do not comply with that request.
"Absolutely, if we have to throw out a dozen people because they're being arrogant assholes, selfish pricks. You're annoying the people around you. I know there's all kinds of arguments, like, 'Well, the removing all those people is annoying." Uh-huh. It's called consequences. This is what happens here."
"You do it in a theater, you do it at a play, you do it at an orchestral performance, you get removed. You don't get to do it. Do it at an opera, you're leaving. It's rude. You're here to experience a thing. You paid all that money to be here to witness what we do, not what you do."
The band enacted the practice of banning phones on their Australian tour in 2020. That tour was in celebration of their record Fear Inoculum. The album featured the Grammy Award-winning track 7empest. Fear Inoculum was the band's first album in thirteen years, but they've made public overtures that the next one won't be anywhere near as long in the making.
One of the most unique and influential bands ever, the prog-metal act have been a big part of the soundscapes that have defined multiple eras of heavy music. Speaking to Maniacs, Sunk Loto vocalist Jason Brown revealed that while writing their landmark album Between Birth and Death they were inspired by Tool to strive to deliver something timeless.
“Oh, yeah, there was definitely talk around in the writing of that record that we wanted to definitely make something that was timeless. We thought that some records around that time, like Deftone’s White Pony and the Tool records, we thought that they had that quality. It was timeless music. That's sort of what we set out to do. 20 years later is still as relevant as it was back then. Nothing sounds dated. Nothing sounds like ‘Yeah, that was cool back then. But it doesn't really sound that good to these now’. A lot of albums that I listened to back then, I couldn’t say the same thing about now. I liked them when I was around them, but looking back now you sort of see holes in them. I think we've done a great job with achieving that timeless quality that we set out to achieve.”
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