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Tool`s Sober, album Undertow. Music video from the Salival DVD box set, 2000.

“Sober” was one of the earliest songs composed by its writer, Maynard James Keenan, with roots dating back to a 1987 live performance (released as Peace Day with his first band, Children of the Anachronistic Dynasty, in which the song was called “Burn About Out”. The song contains some lyrics from the first verse of “Sober”, with the same basic melody, although the melody is considerably faster and has an instrumental chorus. The song was recorded by Keenan with Tool for the first time in mid-1991 on an untitled demo tape referred to as 72826.

A video for “Sober” was made in 1993. It was filmed using stop-motion animation, with characters’ models designed by Adam Jones and directed by Fred Stuhr. It was the first of Tool’s videos to be made in stop motion, the earlier promo video for “Hush” being live action and featuring all four band members. However, brief flashes of the musicians can be seen near the beginning, as well as a live-action figure twitching and vibrating violently (à la the film Jacob’s Ladder).

Besides being one of their first videos, it is also one of Tool’s most ambiguous. Its protagonist is a small, humanoid being, who lives and sleeps in a rusty room sparsely decorated with a bed, table and chair. He happens upon a wooden box, which he opens near the beginning. Its contents are kept hidden for the majority of the video’s duration, but it seems whatever it is has had adverse effects - there are repeated shots of the humanoid levitating in his chair, and his head and arm vibrating wildly. While experiencing these effects, he ventures through his living quarters and its many corridors.

The climax provides a barrage of imagery and revelations: a figure attached to a wall behind a translucent screen, a sentry of sorts wielding a mobile, robotic cannon and a worm like, organic creature hidden within the house’s pipes. At the end, the box is empty, leaving the viewer to determine its meaning.

More on the DVD…