So Maynard James Keenan has said that Tool are working on their next album, and that “If it comes together” they may even play some new shit live this summer. I’m always totally down for some new Tool, so I won’t even say what we’re all thinking, which is “It might be nice to a get a new Tool album in under five years for a change.” I mean, we’d heard that Tool were in writing mode back in 2008, but whatever. It’s Tool. If they need that time to make the best possible record that they can, I’ll go along with it.

But a new Tool album was always a foregone conclusion; the band may very well break our hearts and throw in the towel one day, but we are (very luckily) not there yet.

So more interesting, in a way, is the news that writing has begun on a new album for A Perfect Circle. Not “more interesting” in a APC > Tool way, ’cause, come ON, that would just be a ridiculous argument to try and make. Interesting in the “Oh, cool, A Perfect Circle really aren’t done” kinda way.

That’s not news, exactly, ’cause after Ashes Divide didn’t really work out, Billy Howerdel disbanded that project and said that APC were coming back – but that was after Maynard had declared APC dead and buried. Now a new APC offering sounds like a really real thing. Which is great. APC were awesome. I saw them live twice, and they were terrific both times. Sure, that last covers record was pretty silly, but the original song it featured, “Passive,” was still pretty good. I could go for some more APC.

Of course, APC was barely ever a real band to begin with, so when I say that “writing has begun for a new album,” well, writing probably began about an hour after Howerdel put Ashese Divide out of its misery. In case you’ve never heard this Cinderella story: Howerdel was a guitar tech to numerous big-name bands (Nine Inch Nails, The Smashing Pumpkins, etc.) and was working on Chinese Democracy when then-GN’R drummer Josh Freese passed Howerdel’s demos onto Maynard, who subsequently saved both Howerdel and Freese from Axl Rose (a fact for which Rose has apparently never forgiven Keenan). Thus, A Perfect Circle was born. I’m sure plenty of people would argue that it was almost completely irrelevant who filled the bassist and second guitarist slots, and to some extent, they’d be right. (And with the band’s most recent bassist, Jeordie “Twiggy Ramirez” White, now back in Marilyn Manson, I’d wager he’s not coming back to the fold anyway. But I hear that James Iha has some free time.) But Freese spends so much time working as a session drummer for bland albums like Slash, even just hearing him do something that allows him to be the amazing fucking drummer he’s capable of being would be sweet.

Best of all, a new APC album and tour means that Howerdel will stop hitting me up for money. I mean, GAWD, dude. The next time you get a royalty check, put it in a savings account or something, okay?

-AR