![]() ![]() Be warned: they are also fingerprint magnets.įlip through the book's mind-bending Grey artwork and painted portraits of each Tool member to the credits page, and you'll find that Fear Inoculum's prior releases use a different mastering than that of the newly arrived vinyl version. Compared to other etched records in my collection, these look more like screen prints. Speaking on The Vinyl Guide podcast, design and layout lead Mackie Osborne shared that the etchings in particular were a tough element to get right, ultimately appearing fainter and less pronounced than expected. Signed or not, it remains an ornate offering: five single-sided records come housed in an alluring full-colour, mirror-board printed hardcover book, which slides into a matching bluish-purple mirror-board slipcase that people are already mounting on their walls.Īlbum sides B, D, F, H and J feature etchings of artwork by recurring visual collaborator Alex Grey, found in the hardcover book alongside lyrics (except "7empest," oddly), credits and exquisite die-cut design pages. ![]() As the first copies sold by the band at performances were autographed, preliminary offerings from an industry mired in manufacturing crisis, the subsequent wide release now sees the package priced at a little over $200 CAD. The newly released 5LP ultra-deluxe edition of Fear Inoculum crushes that competition. Fear Inoculum also suffered a similar fate: without an LP package arriving concurrently with other formats in 2019, the market was soon flooded with unofficial 2LP versions of various hues - looking aesthetically amateur compared to the set we see now. Listener reviews of this version often reach a similar conclusion: it sounds pretty terrible.Īs the "vinyl revival" spun into action this last decade, hard-to-find titles like Ænima and unsanctioned vinyl releases like 10,000 Days were given unofficial coloured vinyl pressings by enterprising record manufacturers, believed to have cut the grooves from digital audio sources of lesser quality than actual album masters. The lone official vinyl issue of 2001's Lateralus was pressed as a picture disc, a record format known to prioritize visual appeal over audio fidelity. Original pressings of '90s outings like Undertow and Ænima have come to command hundreds or even thousands of dollars on the secondary market. Until the arrival of Fear Inoculum's 5LP package this month, the band's apparent avoidance of the vinyl record format has left analog-minded Tool lovers in the lurch. Upon the latter album's initial release in 2019, three different variants of its CD edition arrived packaged in a brochure-style digipak that came with a rechargeable four-inch HD screen (with internal two-watt speaker) playing exclusive video "Recusant Ad Infinitum," a 36-page booklet and download card - the kind of trifold you might be handed by someone asking, "Do you have a moment to talk about our Lord and Saviour, Maynard James Keenan?" An "expanded book edition" of the CD package soon followed, doing away with the rechargeable screen in favour of five exclusive 3D lenticular graphic cards, an expanded 56-page booklet with additional art, and a download of the "Recusant Ad Infinitum" visuals. It's a creative tenet that clearly did not weaken all those years between 10,000 Days and Fear Inoculum. This disc design would go on to win guitarist Adam Jones the 2007 Grammy for Best Recording Package, and through delving into their catalogue later on, I would learn just how much Tool value the form and function of their physical releases. The packaging of Tool's fourth full-length - a foldout laminated sleeve with built-in stereoscopic viewing lenses dominating its detailed cover art - was unlike that of any CD I had seen before. quartet's deep grooves, Fibonacci sequence explainers and the bassline from "Schism," I remember coming across the CD release of 2006's 10,000 Days in a small-town Ontario pawn shop. The initial sticker shock of Tool's ultra-deluxe vinyl version of 2019's Fear Inoculum was warranted, but for the patient many who waited over a decade on the band's fifth studio album, its various elaborate, engaging and expensive physical forms should come as no surprise. ![]()
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