Pneuma

[liz]

Tis but the seasons fragility, calling softly into being a deep abiding chill.

Exceptional vocab

[mattw]

Just wondering where this song sits in your 'Top 5' o 'Top 10' favourite TOOL songs... It might not be your personal favourite as we all have varying tastes, but is it fair to say this is one of TOOL's best songs ever? It's definitely one of their best longer tracks i.e. over 8 minutes.

The album has been out over a month now and, after numerous plays all the way through the album, this is probably THE song I keep coming back to more than any other. I love Tempest, especially the 10:35 to 11:50 climactic part, and Invincible sounds fantastic, but Pneuma keeps pulling me in. I'm just not sure why.

Maybe it's the quintessential TOOL song; it has a little bit of everything we seem to love about this band. I think any of following epic tracks (over 8 minutes) get a mention in just about anyone's top ten TOOL song list, or even top five:

Lateralus
Third Eye
Pneuma
Tempest
Invincible
Descending
Pushit
Eulogy
The Grudge
Reflection
10,000 Days
Rosetta Stoned


^Fuck, that's a pretty solid list. I left out Right In Two, No Quarter, Fear Inoculum and Ticks & Leeches. Jesus.

[children]

I would put Parabol/a in that list. Clearly meant to be one piece of music. But I am actually glad they made it into two tracks because it can be fun to jump right into it and have it blast you off when least expecting it.

Did you mean to not include Culling Voices? It's funny with these songs, I always forget how long they are. I imagine Culling Voices as being one of the short songs in their catalogue. Pneuma feels half as long as it actually is; it is stunning that it is almost 12 minutes.

I used to feel that the old long songs went on and on, and sort of had trouble wrapping my head around them. It was kind of like how some people with Fear Inoculum feel that Tool is just jamming endlessly when in fact these are very well thought out compositions.

It took me a long time to really understand Third Eye, Pushit, Reflection, Rosetta Stoned, and Wings, but now those are just as listenable as any other songs. I think a lot of the people who are unhappy with the album are just going through a similar thing because the entire album is made up purely of the extremely long and epic tracks and I am willing to bet these same people probably wouldn't lean towards Third Eye as their go-to Tool track anyway so they didn't have a chance with this thing be accessible to them.

Also, you forgot You Lied too..

[tys0n]

Pretty sure Third Eye clicked with me straight away, 'blue as our new second sun'

[mattw]

Hmm, fair points. However, I limited my list to 12 songs here and had to exclude a few nice tracks I like such as Right In Two and No Quarter. Allow me to clarify though.

1) I agree with you regarding Parabol/a. I prefer it when they play the whole thing live but I know what you mean when Parabola is launched into on its own etc.

2) Culling Voices is nice and I actually really like it now (a month later) but I'm not sure I could include it over any of those 12 long tracks I picked.

3) You Lied is okay. I enjoyed seeing it live. But it is a cover and if I'm only going to include ONE cover song here it's No Quarter.

If I had to cull my list down to only 10 long tracks, I might remove Eulogy. Not sure exactly.

And, yes, I just used the word cull. Somewhat intentional

[children]

Pretty sure Third Eye clicked with me straight away, 'blue as our new second sun'

Well that must mean you're a genius!!

I don't remember what my first impression was exactly.

I think I liked certain parts right away and was intrigued by the drumming because I had just never heard anything like it before. There is so many dense instrumental passages in Third Eye that it took a long time to process and figure out what is going on.

I remember that I always thought it sounded good and would rock out to it all the time but for years it sounded like the band was just jamming on and on and I didn't see all of it as meaningful music that represented something, until at some point I had an epiphany with it and realized what they had achieved.

I guess you could say that it wasn't until my own third eye was opened that I could actually percieve it fully. I mean that song to me literally represents what it's like to have some kind of psychedelic experience. One of the most stunning pieces of music, but I can see how a passing listener would hear it and think they are just randomly jamming.

The 'prying open my third eye' bit used to be kind of abrasive to me as well but I couldn't imagine the song without it now.

[children]

Hmm, fair points. However, I limited my list to 12 songs here and had to exclude a few nice tracks I like such as Right In Two and No Quarter. Allow me to clarify though.

1) I agree with you regarding Parabol/a. I prefer it when they play the whole thing live but I know what you mean when Parabola is launched into on its own etc.

2) Culling Voices is nice and I actually really like it now (a month later) but I'm not sure I could include it over any of those 12 long tracks I picked.

3) You Lied is okay. I enjoyed seeing it live. But it is a cover and if I'm only going to include ONE cover song here it's No Quarter.

If I had to cull my list down to only 10 long tracks, I might remove Eulogy. Not sure exactly.

And, yes, I just used the word cull. Somewhat intentional

Tough to narrow it down to 10. If you removed Eulogy you would still have 11 tracks though lol! Gotta take off one more!! I would maybe take off Tempest and The Grudge or Eulogy I guess. It feels wrong though. Eulogy was probably the first track that made me think there was something really really different about this band.

We both forgot Merkaba too!! Ahhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!

[mattw]

Okay, let's narrow it down then. I know I cut out Eulogy to make it 11 but I couldn't definitively remove one more. I think the following need to be in any top ten epic/long TOOL playlist (i.e. songs over 8 minutes):

Lateralus
Third Eye
Pneuma

After that, it's getting pretty tough to omit one. I think the 3 listed above might be considered top 3 by most fans in some order. Lateralus and Third Eye made the final of that bracket thing ala March Madness someone did back in 2013 i think. But given how much love Pneuma seems to be getting we might have to add it and create a top 3.

It's hard to order Pushit, 7empest, Invincible, Descending, Wings For Marie/10,000 Days and D/R/T. Maybe you are right about omitting The Grudge and perhaps Rosetta Stoned.

As for Merkaba, I left it out since I already included Pushit, whether you want to include it as the original version or the Salival version. I like both.

This also now begs the question as to how we order TOOL's shorter tracks i.e. those UNDER 8 mins

Stinkfist
Sober
46 & 2
Aenema
Jambi
The Pot
Schism
Parabola

Try coming up with a top 5 for each category; it's actually pretty difficult

[children]

I would have to go back and listen to literally all of them again..hold on a sec....

[Boldizar]

Psst, there is a countdown thread on the main Tool board.

[tys0n]

Tool has a main board?

[snazzlefrass]

So the newmah thread became “My Top 10 That Now Includes Newwmahh” thread.

How great is that guitar part towards the end? Fuck your top 10, what about that guitar part?!?!??

[mattw]

In short: it's a great song.

It's all good.

[7oolband]

So the newmah thread became “My Top 10 That Now Includes Newwmahh” thread.

How great is that guitar part towards the end? Fuck your top 10, what about that guitar part?!?!??

it reminds me of a live segue they used from 2014. The accompanying visual looked like a long and winding road along a vast sandy highway and everything else looked deserted and dead. there was a sun in the distance shining oh so brightly. I was playing with 7empest 1 minute intro and slowed down to half speed and it also reminds me of this visual. The slowed down intro on 7empest has a very familiar sound to it, similar imo to the badass guitar solo that emerges from Intension's ambient ensemble.

So many sounds and different places Fi can take you in the matter of a couple of minutes. i said it before but Fi is like a 7 course meal with tiny delicious morsels of excellence mixed in with May Jay finely aged whines.

[snazzlefrass]

Well, there goes that.

[Specter]

If this song ain’t a dandy.

[Takeo]

Pneuma is tedious and drags and drags and drags. Let’s move this thing along, my god.

[Kittaan]

Banned!

[bob]

i like pneuma quite a bit. invincible is prob the most realized of what they were going for or something. Tempest has to be played live. that song just begs for it. i listen to Pneuma more then that one but still.

[ms2r]

Ban him Kittaan.Do it. (Palpatine voice).

[_peterpwn02]

wut

[tys0n]

I love the line 'We go round one foot nailed down'

The imagery and thought it provokes, why are we are what we are, what is holding us back exactly?

Are we just a design flaw?

Or was it all answered already in the tv series All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace?

cough cough

[hellboy]

I love the line 'We go round one foot nailed down'

I think that's my favorite line from the album

[tompie]

What I wouldn't pay to hear the isolated vocal tracks on this one...

[Kittaan]

Apparently, all you need is the right equipment, somehow taken past security, the skill to use it and capture the isolated tracks and....

Yeah, never mind.

But, me too