Tool surprised fans in California last week by breaking out a surprise set. Check out footage and images of the moment below.
READ MORE: Tool talk touring and the timing of new material: “It definitely comes on our own terms”
The moment took place at the Bass Magazine Awards, held at The Observatory in Santa Ana, California last Thursday (January 23). At the event, the members were on site to celebrate bassist Justin Chancellor’s win of the Lifetime Achievement Award.
Fans in attendance were told that Chancellor would be taking to the stage to perform alongside fellow bass players Victor Wooten – known for his work as part of Béla Fleck and the Flecktones – and Steve Bailey, who is Berklee’s chair of the bass department. It was also said that he would be performing alongside “members of Tool”, although it was not clarified that this meant the full line-up.
At the intimate event, bandmates Maynard James Keenan (singer), Adam Jones (guitarist) and Danny Carey (drummer) made a surprise appearance and performed two fan-favourite tracks. The first was ‘Schism’, taken from the 2001 album ‘Lateralus’, and this was followed by ‘Jambi’, which featured on the 2006 follow-up album ‘10,000 Days’.
Check out images and videos of the set below.
Clip of TOOL performing at NAMM 2025.
byu/Montauk_123 inToolBand
Tool celebrated the bassist’s Lifetime Achievement Award on social media ahead of the ceremony, with a post on the band’s official Instagram page reading: “Congratulations to our very own Justin Chancellor as he’s honoured with a Bass Magazine Lifetime Achievement Award in recognition of his bass wizardry and alchemy with Tool, since 1995.”
Danny Carey also posted a tribute on his own social media pages after the event, sharing a photo of Chancellor at the ceremony and writing in the caption: “Congratulations, my brother!”
The surprise set at the Bass Magazine Awards last week comes ahead of the band gearing up to host the first instalment of their own festival, Tool In The Sand.
Labelled as an “all-inclusive” experience, it is set to be held across three days in March in Punta Cana, Dominican Republic. Tool will perform two sets at the festival, as will Mastodon, Primus, Coheed And Cambria, Eagles Of Death Metal, CKY, King’s X and more. Alex Grey and Allyson Grey – artists that play a large part in Tool’s imagery and album covers – have also been named as special guests.
Last year, Chancellor spoke with NME about the pressure from fans to release new music, and when they hope to release the highly anticipated follow-up to ‘Fear Inoculum’, which came out in 2019.
“The only pressure comes when we announce that we’re working on something new, because then we have to make our own predictions for when it’ll come out, and obviously you feel like you let people down if you don’t release it in a certain amount of time,” he said.
“It’s a nice feeling that people still want new stuff, but also they’ve got to understand that it’s not the easiest thing to do. It’s not a simple thing and it’s not always a natural thing that comes at the time you want it to come. Art is a very strange animal and it has its own schedule.”
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