Favorite Live Bands #1 - Tool

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It's finale time yet again. We have reached #1 in my Favorite Live Bands series, which celebrates my love of live music. The top designation belongs to Tool. Progressive metal band Tool formed in Los Angeles in 1990. One of the few bands that maintain full creative control over their product, Tool has won three Grammy Awards, including one for Best Recording Package for their album 10,000 Days. I have seen Tool twice, on the same tour (Lateralus) no less. I saw them, with King Crimson, at Denver's Red Rocks Amphitheater, in 2001. Because the local King Crimson fans had snatched up a lot of the tickets, I ended up paying $300 through a local ticket broker company (a legal scalper, basically.) Believe it or not, it was worth every penny. Sadly, the King Crimson fans all split after that band's opening set. Too bad for them, because they missed out on a hell of a set by the headliners. Highly technical, Tool is so tight, so razor sharp in concert, that even a non fan (say, a King Crimson fan, had any of them bothered to stay,) should be able to be impressed. Later, the band came back through Denver, this time with Mike Patton's band Tomahawk in tow, playing the Pepsi Center, where the Colorado Avalanche and Denver Nuggets play. And as good as the Red Rocks show was, they were on fire that night at Pepsi Center. Tool uses a lot of animated visuals as they play, designed and directed by guitarist Adam Jones. Jones had totally revamped them for that leg of the tour, which meant we were treated to a fresh video package. That, combined with the fact that the band was in top form, made for the best concert I've ever seen, and hence, my favorite live band. "Celebrate this chance to be, alive and breathing." (My apologies for the video, it was the best I could find. It simply doesn't do the stage show justice, and really doesn't capture the sheer power of the Tool experience.) (Lyrics by Maynard James Keenan)