OCCULTURE 142: Occult Fan // Esoteric & Occult Themes in TOOL’s Fear Inoculum

The one and only Occult Fan, aka Nathan Lee Miller Foster, is back in the house for a third time. Nathan Lee is a musician, writer at OccultFan.com, and host of the Six of Swords podcast, and we are going to dig deep into a piece of art that was forged by four of the most marvelous magicians of our modern era. Collectively they are known as TOOL, one of the pre-eminent musical forces roaming the realm today. Their latest album, Fear Inoculum, is their first in 13 years. Highly anticipated by both fans and critics alike, and from the sounds of things, was well worth the wait.

But this is not a critical review of that album. This is a complete and total thematic deconstruction of what this album is about, song by song, image by image, even tweet by tweet, because this is a band that has become known for their meticulousness. Every riff, every polyrhythm, every lyric, every liner note, every visual set piece associated with their musical catalog is carefully curated and then deeply dissected by their fanbase, for better or for worse, but always in good fun and good faith.

Nathan Lee and I did this way back in episode 35 for another album by the band, so we figured, why not do it again and share it with all of you? Because, when we started to dig into this from a thematic standpoint, we found such a rich message laced with both apt cultural commentary and poignant interpersonal insight. It’s both a warning and a prescription, as any piece of good art is, and whether you know the band or not, or whether you’ve heard the music or not, it’s all kind of irrelevant for the purposes of this discussion, unless you want to completely comprehend all of Nathan Lee’s references that stem from his extensive knowledge of the band and their history.

RESOURCES

• Nathan Lee’s website
• Nathan Lee on Twitter
• Nathan Lee on Bandcamp
• TOOL’s Fear Inoculum on Amazon

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MUSIC

Vestron Vulture - “I Want to Be a Robot (Tribute to Giorgio Moroder)”

Occams Laser - "Martyr Farker (Occulture Edit)"

PRODUCTION & LICENSING

This podcast is produced in the Kingdom of Ohio and is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International.

Executive Producers: Mauricio G., Daniel R., Kelly C., Bruce H., Christopher B., Timothy W., Nick F., Michael Q., Jamaica J., Mute Ryan, John W., Andy E., Colleen F., Saliyah S., Michael S., Kevin C., Megan B., Kaleb H., Dionisio T., Scotty R., CL, Raymond G.

REMINDER

Love yourself. Think for yourself. Question authority.