How I learned to hear Tool

On the Eve of Speaking with Ève Poudrier Some time ago, my family and I were driving home on the Sea to Sky Highway late at night. Our son was coming back from university for fall break. He wanted me to listen to a song from a band he had discovered. He handed me one of his earbuds and explained that their music was unique; it was built on mathematical ratios of time, odd time signatures, and long unfolding song structures. My first exposure to Tool was through that single earbud, but I wasn’t initially drawn in. Music isn’t as much a part of my life as words are, and so I often associate music more with memory than with the listening experience. My son's playing of Tool on subsequent drives also didn’t change much. In fact, the band, to me, seemed elusive, far from the music genre of progressive rock that I would like, and many songs later, the same feeling remained. But then one day, something switched. We were visiting my father and about to turn off Highway 1, and this song,…