Tool Become First Act to Have All Top 10 Rock Digital Songs
Is there a band other than Tool who has ever benefitted more from joining streaming services? If you needed any further proof that their fans were longing for this day, all you have to do is look at Billboard's Rock Digital Song Sales Chart, where Tool currently hold down the Top 10 spots.
"Sober," currently holds down the No. 1 position, while "Fear Inoculum," "Schism," "Forty Six & 2," "Stinkfist," "AEnema," "The Pot," "Vicarious," "Lateralus" and "Prison Sex" round out the Top 10. It's not until Panic! At the Disco's "Hey Look Ma, I Made It," last week's No. 1 song that drops to No. 11, that you'll find a non-Tool track. In fact, add yet another five tracks ("Eulogy," "Parabola," "Jambi," "H." and "Parabola") inside the Top 25 on the chart.
So why did it take so long for Tool to go digital? Speaking in the current issue of Kerrang!, drummer Danny Carey chalked it up to their complicated label history and record deal. He explained, “We signed a five-record deal that was based around CDs. It got to this point where to accomplish the finality of releasing this record, we had to negotiate the whole digital domain. And we had already missed out on a huge facet of that as far as the download thing. It was a culture shock for us, but it’s a necessary [thing] that has to be done if you want to reach people with your art.”
While Carey says he doesn't mind streaming their music, it does come with some reservations. “I don’t mind the streaming thing. The one thing that’s disappointing to me is that it caters to that shorter attention span. I don’t think that leaves much room for people, like us, that want to release a bigger package of music that’s more like reading a book than listening to a commercial," stated the drummer, adding, "This was written and composed to be an album, an experience you can dig into for 80 to 90 minutes. But I don’t know how many people are left out there in the world willing to do that. When I was a kid I bought records and played them from beginning to end. That’s what I grew up on, so that’s what I’m still doing.”
Full album experience or not, fans seems to be digging the band's music finally being available via streaming services. In addition to all the other cool numbers to come from this release boom, Tool now sits at No. 1 on Billboard's Artist 100 chart, becoming only the seventh act to ever debut at the top spot on the chart.
According to Billboard, the Artist 100 measures artist activity across key metrics of music consumption, blending album and track sales, radio airplay, streaming and social media fan interaction to provide a weekly multi-dimensional ranking of artist popularity.
As previously reported, five of their albums now sit in the Billboard 200 Album Chart, while the new title track from their upcoming album Fear Inoculum just cracked the Billboard Hot 100. The track also set a record for the longest song to ever appear on the chart.
Tool's Fear Inoculum drops Aug. 30 and you can also catch them on the road in support of the album. Get ticketing info here.
Tool Albums Ranked, From Worst to Best