Unleashed: The Story of Tool

by Joel McIver

The very first book about the Anglo-American metal band Tool explores not only their uncompromising music but also their unsettling, self-made image based on mythological symbols and arcane theories. Author Joel McIver leaves no detail omitted as he delves into the mystery behind Tool's music.

Genres: Music, Biography, Nonfiction, Music Biography, American, History

246 pages, Paperback

First published January 12, 2009

Reviews

[Kat · Rating 2 out of 5]

First of all, you are probably better to read the Toolshed FAQ about Tool if you want to learn more about the music. You can also find a huge collection of interviews there, where quotes may be better taken in their context rather than thrown in here and not referenced anywhere. Basically this book is a cut and paste of quotes from the members of Tool from various interviews throughout the years, and the author's "insights" are shallow at best. It was nice to read the quotes altogether, but if you have already read a lot of interviews, you know mostly what they are going to say.

The author is almost constantly setting up Tool in the context of "nu metal" (as in, how they are nothing like it), which is barely mentioned in the quotes by the actual band members. I found this extremely frustrating as it appears that this is the only other music the author knows of. Who cares? What a waste of paper.

While I liked the last portion of the book, where actually there haven't technically been any Tool activities, however all he talks about is Maynard and the other members' activities are not even mentioned. I understand that Maynard has the higher profile than Adam, Danny and Justin, but come on, it's about Tool, not Puscfier or A Perfect Circle. SOME mention would be nice.

Basically I liked reading the quotes and it reminded me how much I love Tool but if you really want to learn about the band, don't read this, just visit toolshed.down.net and explore yourself rather than read the author's inane lines in between the quotes.

[Vismund · Rating 4 out of 5]

5 stars for source material, cause it's Tool and one of my fav all time bands
3 stars for writing, which I found very lackluster and many parts were repetitive and derivative

[K · Rating 3 out of 5]

Reading this book ten years after its release, and still waiting for that fifth studio album.

Tool definitely is a band that deserves it’s insightful and elaborate biography, but sadly this isn’t it. McIver assembled the book mostly from various articles and interviews throughout Tool’s career, adding some of his own thoughts and analyses. Band itself was not involved in contributing material to this book. Undeniably informative read for anyone wanting to know more about Tool, but regrettably shallow in the end.

[sologdin · Rating 2 out of 5]

A brief overview of the band, its members, and related projects, drawn mostly from things published already elsewhere. It is more or less a cohesive narrative, and includes the author’s analyses of individual songs, which is what interested me most. It does not appear that the author had access to the band itself for interviews, so that limits the endeavor somewhat. It’s current through 2009, and thus doesn’t anticipate the subsequent ten-year wait to get to Fear Inoculum. But of course who could’ve?

Anyway, my favorite rock band, aside maybe from Jane's Addiction and Bowie, so I'm always willing to read about them.

[Maria · Rating 3 out of 5]

with this book I was hoping something that the band would be involved with, but that's not the case. rearranging stuff from various sources really doesn't give enough depth. book probably deserves only two stars but for my love of Tool I'll add one more.
the book is informative and is nice to have a package where everything is in one place. (all though I'm pretty sure everything found this book, could have been found on toolshed.down.net and various other websites. it's just more pleasing to read a book.)
I enjoyed that this book reminded me of stuff I had forgotten and caused massive amounts of nostalgia. but still something annoys me. I guess I just wanted and wished for something more.

also here and there there was few badly written sentences, but I don't know if I should blame for that the original text or the Finnish translation. AND the captions for the pics were really cheesy and corny.

[Derek · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of my favorite bands, and thus, concert shows as well. Always finding new meanings in their music, and enjoy the author a good deal as well. The parts of this book that really captivated me was reading about how the band writes music together, and everything they listen to for inspiration.

[Paul Ispas · Rating 3 out of 5]

Și uite cum poți să-mi împarți opinia: scrie prost, dar obiectiv, despre ceva ce-mi place mult. Din punct de vedere narativ și calitativ, cartea e maximum mediocră. Oferă câteva detalii interesante, unele greu de găsit în alte surse, dar finalmente nu aduce nimic esențial nou. Mai mult, poate fi ușor catalogată drept cartea despre Maynard James Keenan, și Tool ca side-project.
O carte foarte bună pentru fani, dar mediocră altminteri. Sau poate chiar nu am eu gusturi pentru biografii.

[Janne Paananen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Joel McIver jää minun mielestäni musiikkikirjojen kanssa vähän väliinputoajaksi. Yleensä pidän joko muusikoiden itsensä kirjoittamista omaelämäkerroista, joissa keskeisintä on muusikon elämän merkityksellisimmät henkilökohtaiset asiat (jotkai eivät tietenkään aina edes välttämättä liity musiikkiin) tai sitten kattavista historiikeistä, joissa käydään koko historia, tuotanto ja kiertueet millitarkasti läpi. McIver yrittää tasapainoilla jossain tässä välissä, välillä onnistuen kelvollisesti ja välillä kompastuen omaan nokkeluuteensa (esmes Metallica-teos).

Toolin kohdalla käy niin, että teos ei vain jotenkin kosketa, ei pysty luomaan elämänmakuista kuvaa bändin tekemisistä. Toki oleelliset asiat tuodaan esiin ja bändin ja soittajien erikoisuutta tuodaan mukavasti esiin. Mutta vain mukavasti. Miten ihmeessä bändistä, jossa on Maynard Keenanin kaltainen ristiriitainen ja mielenkiintoinen hahmo, voi saada näinkin keskinkertaisen teoksen?

[Andrea · Rating 2 out of 5]

As a fan of the band, I’m fairly disappointed.
Literally just a bunch of declarations taken from interviews to the members of Tool over the years, the book doesn’t add nothing more that would help you understand the music of Tool or their creative process.
I really liked some of the other books by McIver (especially the one on Cliff Burton) this is just not very good.

[Nathaniel Glosson · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the first, and only, biography of my favoite band EVER: Tool. I really enjoyed it...and I didn't want it to end :(

[Deb Omnivorous Reader · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was pretty enthusiastic for this book, Tool has produced some amazing music and finding out a bit more about the band sounded great. I had already read a book a few years back A Perfect Union of Contrary Things which I had enjoyed. However that book had been pretty much about Maynard specifically, with Tool (of course) part of his life but not focusing on the band specifically.

This book is specific to the entire band and I enjoyed it. Funnily enough, while reading it, I discovered that I am probably the band's target listener. I always think of myself as a poor fan. I can love a band's music and own all their albums and seen them live and listen to them a lot BUT still have no idea what the names of the musicians are. For me, it has always been about the music primarily. I have copped a certain amount of scorn over the years from more dedicated fans and I was highly amused to find that Tool appreciates my version of fandom.

This book does a great job of positioning the band in it's time and space within the music industry. Specifically, the American scene at the end of glam metal around the start of nu metal and grunge. As I never really followed music reviews ect this was interesting information, for me and I enjoyed it. However the American-o-centric outlook started puzzling me some way in. Sure, Justin Chancellor was from the UK originally, so there was a tiny bit about UK music scene and the occasional mention of bands from other nations (like Norway) but in general it was America the whole way. This started to puzzle me, as Tool are an intelligent band with lots of different interests and a diversity of sources. That is what makes their music so rich and fascinating. It boggled my mind that none of these musicians had paid any mind to the diversity of music happening around the world and it bemused me when the book claimed a few 'firsts' for the band that I was pretty sure were already happening in the Scandinavian music scene earlier.

So I starter reading a bot more critically.

Now, from reading closely, it is my opinion, that none of the band members ever had much input into this book. I don't think they were interviewed directly, or contributed. It seems to me that the author compiled a whole heap of interviews from a huge number of different sources to produce this book. It must have been an astronomical amount of work, I respect what he has done here... but...

There are times when the same quote is used repetitively, and I am pretty sure at least some of these must be out of context. The chapters are organised by year, so if you are using a quote in 1993 and then again in 2009 it seems to me that at least one of them HAS to be out of context. There is a feeling of cut and paste, emerging about half way through the book, which can make it hard to tell who is being quoted at any one time. The reusing quotes and interviews also gets repetitive as the book progresses.
Page 228, exemplifies how the book uses old interviews in a pastiche. Here it is Jones saying "...our last record was very healing, very 'think for yourself'. The attitude on this record..." (my italics). But that quote is in the 2009 and beyond section and Tool were not working on ANY album at the time. There was no 'this record' and in fact there would not be another record for over ten years. So this quote is out of place.

I tried a few times to figure out which interview's were being used as source material, but I could not figure out the index.

So, fun book, for someone who likes Tool, or music and want's to read about the timeline. If you have been a strong follower of Tool over the years and read all the interviews as they came out (that is SO not me) then you may not find a lot that is new, but kudos to the author for putting it all together in an organised timeline.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9FNZy...

[Heideblume · Rating 4 out of 5]

Su questa biografia ne sono state dette tante: che è inaffidabile perché non è ufficiale, che è un capolavoro, ma anche che è una ciofeca. Sembrerà una frase fatta, ma mai come ora mi sono sentita di dire che la verità sta nel mezzo.
Sì, perché "Unleashed: the story of TOOL" malgrado tutto è una lettura fondamentale per tutti coloro che si approcciano alla loro musica ma ancora non la capiscono o, meglio, non capiscono il modo di ragionare dei quattro uomini che tengono in piedi la band. I TOOL sono così riservati, contraddittori e imprevedibili che senza uno strumento come questo è impossibile venirgli incontro (a meno che non siate fan sfegatati da almeno due decadi e conosciate già i forum del sottobosco).

Obbligatoria per i neofiti, indifferente per gli stagionati.

[Chris Haughton · Rating 2 out of 5]

Tool is my favorite band. They are everything that music needs to be honest and emotional. Their story is interesting, but there are no groupies or drug addiction and then rehab stints. They are artists and very private people. The quotes were interesting. That's the good part of the book. Now, Joel McIver is the "author" of this book. However, the words that he puts between the quotes that you can find if you go searching are the biggest effort from him. This book was basically praising the band. One thing they would not want is praise. If you want to fully appreciate what Tool offers, then listen to the music they create with an open mind and not judge after the first listen. On to the next one.

[Davide Saini · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ottimo punto di partenza se si vuole conoscere la storia del gruppo, un po' meno se si vogliono approfondire le loro tematiche.

Sul primo aspetto si è fatto senz'altro un lavoro certosino, ricostruendo i loro metodi creativi per la composizione dei loro album a livello creativo e logistico, nonché le vicende con le varie case discografiche.
La parte più interessante è il modo con cui si sono mossi dal punto di vista del marketing per la promozione dei loro album e le tecniche utilizzate per i loro particolarissimi video musicali

[- Andrew · Rating 3 out of 5]

Been Tool’s fan since 2019, but I’ve just got to know about Lachrymology couple of months ago, and the resource I looked up for Tool’s 90s interviews that I’ve found on this book. The book give me great background about the origin of Adam, Maynard and his concerns about the modern life, and Danny. One word to say about Tool throughout this book is how pretentious they are; avoiding all of these fashion show artificial things, and that deserves respect.

[Илья Ясный · Rating 5 out of 5]

Книга кончается 2009 годом, но все равное много интересного. Мне, например, понравилось, что в книге хорошо объясняется разница между Tool, A Perfect Circle и Puscifer. И рассказывается про увлечение MJK виноделием, которое как бы проводит паралель между выращиванием винограда и получением из него вина и тем, как музыканты Tool пишут музыку, выращивая композиции.

[Cortney Holbrook · Rating 4 out of 5]

For any hardcore tool fan or any casual fan

These could possibly be 4 of the most unlikeable guys to ever make a form of art. Everything they say has such a condescending tone. Luckily I love their music and couldn't care less what kind of p are bc entertainers are not real ppl to me. So enjoy, these guys are definitely different.

[Tero Niemi · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ihan hyvä intro Toolin maailmaan. Olisin kaivannut hieman läheisempää otetta bändiin, tämä kirja on pääasiassa koostettu haastatteluista ja muusta lähdemateriaalista. Mutta tuli paljon uutta infoa ainakin itselleni ja toimiikin hyvänä aloituspakettina Tool faneille.

[Raymond Strodl · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting insight into this innovative and important band, I must say I preferred Maynard's individual biography, but this was a useful book. This book delved very deeply into the music and its creation and I think would be of limited interest to a non-musician.

[Randy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Liked this book, but didn’t love it. An updated version which discussed their latest album might make it feel more substantial. I’m only a casual fan - I enjoy their musicianship, but never got the humour or supposed depth of their lyrics.

[Daniel Kavanaugh · Rating 5 out of 5]

Tool

Loved this book and Tool is a band that you can’t explain to anyone. You have to feel Tool, if ya know what I mean.

[Peter Ferguson · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is awesome for extended quotes from band members on various topics, but it reads like an extended magazine article. Worth it if you like the band.

[Tom · Rating 3 out of 5]

More of an autobiography of Maynard than the story of Tool. Not bad but far from comprehensive.

[Matthew Stinnett · Rating 3 out of 5]

Okay if picked up on a budget. Not much here that most lifelong Tool fans are already privy to.

[Maha Aoki · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the first and only biography I've read on one of my most favorite bands. This book shed a ton of light to facts I was oblivious to, such as, it was really Adam who formed the band, urging Keenan, and eventually Danny Carey to join. I also learned of how meaningful their lyrics are as well as some of the disguised humor that Keenan incorporated into some of the most serious songs. I also learned the initiative behind every song and every album, and I"ve got to say that Adam was right: "Our music has to inspire us and make us think-and it has to inspire everyone who hears it. It must make them think too. If it doesn't do that, then what was the point of making it in the first place?" Overall, I think this was a great read and wonderfully written. I think I'll read some more of Joel McIver's band biographies.

[Mark Maselli II · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mixed bag

This book offered some good insight into the band. A few things I didn't care for are as follows:
Repetitive, the author rehashed things throughout the book which caused it to drag on much longer than necessary.
When reviewing/analyzing songs, the author would dive deep on some songs and barely discuss others.
As he points out many times, the band writes to have the listeners determine their own meaning, however I felt as though the author tried to impart his interpretation too much.
What I did enjoy was more of the background on the band members and how the band was formed. I thought the book would be more about the journey and less of a review of their songs, it's for this reason that I have mixed feelings about this book and give it three stars.

[Ari · Rating 2 out of 5]

Todella tylsä kirja siihen nähden, että aihe on ehkä maailman kiinnostavin yhtye. Kirja pysytteli lähinnä ulkomusiikillisissa seikoissa ja vältteli minkäänlaista musiikillista analyysiä, aivan yksinkertaisia huomioita tahtilajeista lukuunottamatta. Ulkomusiikillinen analyysi taas tuntui 1) referaatilta lehdille annetuista haastatteluista ja 2) kärsi ylisanoista. Kirjoittaja oli aivan selvästi lähtenyt alusta asti kirjoittamaan kirjaa metalliyhtyeestä "joka muutti koko musiikinlajin peruuttamattomasti", eikä kirjasta sitten paljoa muuta käteen jäänytkään, paria kivaa knoppitietoa lukuunottamatta.

Kiinnostavasta aiheesta kirjoitettu pintapuolinen ja fanituksesta kärsivä, hutaisten käännetty kirja. Ei rohkaise lukemaan muita McIverin teoksia.

[Aquarium · Rating 2 out of 5]

very funny ... otherwise ...

This review sums up my thoughts exactly - http://www.amazon.com/review/R2KWMJY2...

I was wondering while reading - is this book shallow on purpose to make me think or it is just impossible to make a good book about Tool.

I would give it 1 star but I'm newish Tool fan and the biography part was interesting.

[Darrell · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting and mostly informative. But the fact that the author confused the 2004 U.S. Presidential election with the farce that was the 2000 election calls to question the accuracy of some of the other aspects of the book.

Despite that he does provide a good analysis of the music and videos and appears to effectively look through the misdirection inherent in all of Tool's work to provide what hopefully is a clear picture of what the band is about.

[Louis · Rating 5 out of 5]

For anyone who wants to see what makes this band tick, this is the book to read. Really in-depth look at their history, personnel and how they make their music.I know they are not everyone's cup of tea musically , but you gotta give them credit for sticking to their guns.