Why's Tool so cool, but none of their indie fans have ever heard of Neurosis? You know the fans I mean: the we-got-here-via-The-Pixies, tiny-glasses-wearing, retro-tattoo-sporting, I-never-liked-metal-except-for-Master-Of-Puppets-and-then-I-was-on-shrooms kinda hipsters?
Them?
Well, fuck 'em.
I'll put Given To The Rising up against any Tool record. It's bolder, chancier, and more coherent a piece of music than anything Tool has ever made. And yes, I HAVE listened to all of it, both Given To The Rising and Tool's catalog. I don't hate Tool; I'm glad they're there. I'm not a big fan, but I'm first to admit that they're better than 90% of what passes for rock music. Nothing wrong with Tool at all, or A Perfect Circle, for that matter. And I know personally that Tool has done a bit of dues-paying, in that I saw The Melvins open for them on a nasty, windy, rainy night at what was then Oak Mountain Amphitheatre. I was trashed, and spent the whole Tool show hollering, "Bring back the Melvins!", much to the dismay of the people I was with.
*looks knowingly at Chappy*
But here's Neurosis, steadfastly doing their own thing, running their own label, spawning their own whole genre of heavy music. Fugazi gets nominated for sainthood for that shit. And much of Neurot's catalog, unlike Dischord's, is damned good.
But Tool's somehow carrying the torch. I don't get it. I guess that doesn't fit the narrative, the comfortable story. There's a comfortable indie rock story, just like there's a comfortable Iraq war story and a comfortable election story and a comfortable that-cunt-in-a-hat-from-The-Libertines-gets-his-cat-high-on-crack story.
I think there's some weird anti-prog-post-punk backlash going on.
Rue Gama.
1 hour ago
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Huh, I've never liked metal except for Neurosis, but then I grew up in DC, so you probably know where my sympathies lie.
Seriously, I remember being so thoroughly fucked by Neurosis's third album that I still haven't recovered. I even wrote a question on Askme inspired by it.
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