Third Eye Open: How Ænima solidified Tool’s status as the weirdest, most singular force in mainstream metal

How many bands are out there with the subversive intelligence, unwavering nerve and sheer unhinged chutzpah to open their ​‘difficult second album’ straight-faced with a song about anal fisting? Reckon you could count their number on one hand? We wager it’d take just a single (moderately malodorous) finger. Although their music landed without a hint of fratboy puerility, Tool didn’t even try to hide their mischievousness. If people were too blind – or simply too stunned – to pick up on the title Stinkfist, singer Maynard James Keenan’s cheeky (cheek-splitting?) chorus refrain of ​‘Relax, turn around, take my hand…’ laid the meaning grubbily bare. Taking the piss? Amateur. These lads were dragging out the shit as well… The stony-faced solemnity with which critics an...

unsplash-logoLilith Redmoon