The Press Release:
TOOL celebrates their third consecutive #1 debut on Billboard’s Top 200, with Fear Inoculum (RCA Records) reigning over the U.S. sales charts, selling 270,000 units.
The news of Fear Inoculum’s impressive debut comes amidst news stories of the album release being met by lengthy lines at retailers as music lovers clamored to get a copy of the limited edition, physical version of the CD. The spectacular, groundbreaking packaging boasts a 4” HD rechargeable screen with exclusive video footage, charging cable, 2 watt speaker, a 36-page booklet and a digital download card. The Coalition of Independent Music Stores (CIMS) released a rare statement, describing the event-like album release: “Several stores had well-attended midnight sales on Thursday (it was my store’s first midnight sale in 10 years). When we returned to work on Friday morning, there were lines at the door… the TOOL release was the biggest thing to hit retail in years.”
The success wasn’t isolated to the U.S., with the album debuting at #1 in Australia, Norway, New Zealand, and Belgium, as well as Top 5 debuts in the UK, Germany, The Netherlands, Ireland, Italy and Finland.
Critically, the album was met with equal enthusiasm. NPR proclaimed “Fear Inoculum was worth the 13-year wait,” NME awarded the 10-track offering a perfect 5 star score, The Atlantic dubbed it “precise and devastating,” Revolver declared it “a masterpiece that will be dissected for years to come” and Entertainment Weekly said the collection is “deeply satisfying, both as a distinct artistic statement and as accidental fan service to a base that expects nothing less than unflinchingly unique artistic statements.”
News of the Fear Inoculum’s impressive debut follows the announcement of TOOL’s first North American tour in support of the album.
Editorial Sidebar: We broadcast about the tour HERE. Check it out 🙂
TOOL formed in 1990, releasing four multi-platinum studio albums: Undertow (1993), Ænima (1996), Lateralus (2001) and 10,000 Days (2006); two EPs: 72826 (1991) and Opiate (1992) and the limited-edition boxset Salival (2000). The band has won three GRAMMY Awards®: Best Metal Performance (1998, “Ænima”), Best Metal Performance (2002, “Schism”) and Best Recording Package (2007, 10,000 Days). TOOL is Danny Carey (drums), Justin Chancellor (bass), Adam Jones (guitar) and Maynard James Keenan (vocals).
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PiercingMetal Thoughts: Now before I say anything else I’d like to wish a world of congratulations to the guys in Tool for crafting and releasing what some of my friends have told me is an “absolute masterpiece” of an album. Speaking honestly, I have not yet managed to sink my teeth into the full album because I don’t have my copy yet. I was really vying for the super cool special edition listed above but couldn’t get one despite trying a few different places. I did listen to their debut single which is also the title of the album and I loved what I was hearing. You readers can see that brief by clicking HERE and please stay tuned to the website for a full on review of the whole work. I just need to place my order on Amazon and since I don’t have Prime, it will be a couple of more weeks before that arrives. What’s also amusing about this news is the reports that the fans of Pop Queen Taylor Swift are angry about this brand new band named Tool taking the spot from their favorite artist. They’ve been screaming about this outrage across the interwebs and its pretty amusing. Hey kids, maybe brush up just a wee bit on your music history before tweeting and gramming and Facebooking how furious you are about this stuff. I am sure your multi-millionaire artist Taylor will come out of this just fine. My prediction. I’ll close up now and wonder what you think about the news. You can share your thoughts about it down in the comments section below but leave any lengthy album views for when I post that review since they will compliment it for sure. See you next time.
Official Website: http://www.toolband.com