One Day With 10,000 Days

I've only logged one discontinuous listen to Tool's new 10,000 Days so far, but it's definitely working for me. First blush is that it's a more engaging, more refined version of Lateralus. On the one hand, that makes it still not up to the level of Aenima, but that's a desert island disk for me, so it may be asking a lot. On the other hand, it strikes me as a really, really solid effort, and Lateralus could have used the improvement in the first place.

The record store nearest my office had sold out of their initial shipment when I stopped by at lunch yesterday, so I had them hold a copy in their Wednesday allotment. In true record store clerk fashion, the call I got went something like "hello, I'm calling about your Tool."

And while I try not to wear my eclectic tastes as some sort of badge of honor, yesterday's purchase was Tool, Gomez, Prince and Alejandro Escovedo -- I would have added Roy Hargrove's new RH Factor disk to that total, but they sold out of that on Tuesday as well -- which makes for a nice cross-section of new listening.