New TOOL Album Update

According to The Pulse Of Radio, there's been some movement on the TOOL front regarding the band's long-awaited fifth studio album. The person inside the TOOL circle who usually posts news at the band's official web site has published a somewhat lengthy new update, in which he writes, "A couple of weeks ago I visited the TOOL loft to try and get some kind of idea as to how things were progressing with the writing sessions now that the band was back hard at it. Well, I am happy to report that there has indeed been a lot of progress as far as new material goes, especially with the lengthy so-called 'epic' piece that the guys have been arranging for quite some time now."

The post continues that before the band put on their instruments, everyone in the room listened to the demos they had recorded at the previous session. The insider writes, "Judging from the smiles on their faces, it seemed that, for the most part, (the band members) liked very much what they were hearing and that after some finishing touches, the 'epic' tune would be ready for Maynard (James Keenan, vocals) to do his thing."

The writer adds that the "epic" song contains "complex time signatures, interesting harmonic structure and expanding effects processing — similar to what fans of TOOL have come to expect — only now, perhaps not surprisingly, the band has taken it to the next level."

In conclusion, however, the post says, "Please note that I am NOT suggesting in any way that the band is ready to go into the studio any time soon. I honestly have no idea as far as any recording timetables go."

The writer also indicates that he has no idea of how many other songs are near completion musically, or where Keenan stands with his vocals and lyrics.

Keenan told The Pulse Of Radio a while back that fans shouldn't believe everything they read online about the record. "We normally don't say anything about anything until it's actually happening, because there's a lot of people online that apparently can't read very well," he said. "I put an April Fool's notice up there for the album release, and it was 2011, I said, 'New TOOL album, such-and-such a date, 2009, and everybody ran around like, 'Oh, really, the new TOOL --?' God, you guys are dumb. I swear to God. You've got to read. Please, read."

Back in September, Keenan teased new TOOL music for 2014 via a post at his Instagram account. TOOL has not released an album since 2006's "10,000 Days".

Drummer Danny Carey told Loudwire in July that Keenan had not yet started working with the rest of the group at that point, saying, "It's still the three of us right now and four of us it will be soon."