A Perfect Circle

Tool vocalist Maynard James Keenan's side project, A Perfect Circle, overachieves on their second record, which -- in keeping with the title and some of the lingo -- is an opus about recovering from recovery. While the concept may be a little murky, the musicianship is not, what with Marilyn Manson bassist Twiggy Ramirez joining this warlocks' coven with his addiction and Smashing Pumpkins guitarist James Iha as spiritual advisor. Gone is much of the dirty, distorted guitar from their debut, Mers de Noms, replaced with a cleaner, moodier sound that is a perfect match to Keenan's pained laments about loss, surrender and redemption. But the star of the show is the baroque comic relief of "The Nurse That Loved Me."

A Perfect Circle are that rare supergroup: A collective of veteran musicians that actually
adds up to more, not less, than the sum of its parts -- in this case, Tool vocalist Maynard
James Keenan, former Nine Inch Nails roadie Billy Howerdel, session drumming ace Josh
Freese and former Marilyn Manson bassist Jeordie White, a.k.a. Twiggy Ramirez. The band's
second album, Thirteenth Step, sounds more like the dusky thrum of Disintegrati... More >