We're here to report about life

By REBECCA BARRY


Maynard James Keenan has taken the liberty of looking after our mental health. He writes songs "for all of us". Music, explains the lead singer of artfully heavy bands Tool and A Perfect Circle, is a higher form of language that can help self-discovery and, if you're lucky, trigger an out-of-body experience.

Perhaps Britney and T.A.t.U are not such appropriate ambassadors for this concept, but Keenan claims to benefit from his orbital metal and abstract lyrics by feeling the full spectrum of human emotions on stage.

That's how it should be, he says, adding, "Any decent jazz musician worth his weight in spit will be able to step out of their body."

A Perfect Circle's second album, Thirteenth Step, which went to No 1 here last year, is his most introspective work, and with lyrics such as "Cast the calming apple up and over satellites" it probably offers shrinks more insight into his thought processes than his fans.

But that's not the point, he insists. He writes metaphorically, "picking out a palette of paints" so that everyone can relate to the songs. A Perfect Circle's live gigs are a chance for his audience to tap into their own experiences and "explore those areas that need to be explored".

"It's all a positive movement forward to becoming conscious beings," he says, his quiet, measured speech invoking images of Kevin Spacey's serial killer character in Se7en.

"If you can look at everything, every aspect of yourself, and discover what motivates you, why you behave the way you do, how you think compared to the way other people think, the more you become a conscious being and the better off everyone is because then you make a choice about your behaviour."

Quite how A Perfect Circle's music does this is as perplexing as the man himself.

A former art student, US Army soldier and continuing fan of science fiction writer Isaac Asimov, the wiry singer will be recognised by fans regardless of the wigs, makeup or trippy lighting in which he performs - disguises intended to prioritise the music over his personality, partly for his 8-year-old son's sake.

"It's much easier for people to let their inner stuff come out and play on Halloween, right? Put on the mask, put on the wig, put on the funny pants and the funny nose, then you can let these things kind of come out and feel safe and create a safe space to do that.

"You get that feeling when you don't think anyone's around, and the music's up full-blast, you're singing at the top of your lungs in the shower in a completely safe, womb-like situation - and little do you know, your room-mates have showed up and they're, like, horrified at what they're hearing. That's the kind of scenario we're trying to set up."

Presumably he would prefer listeners not to be horrified at what they're hearing, but Keenan is surely aware the mystery fuels his fans' fascination. Eventually he'll answer to that, should his website, maynardjameskeenan.com ever be completed - and the longer that takes, the more fans will inevitably want to see it.

Worthy of just as much attention are the rest of his band, a tour de force comprising former Smashing Pumpkins guitarist James Iha, former Marilyn Manson bass player Jeordie White, the Vandals/Devo drummer Josh Freese and chief songwriter and band co-founder Billy Howerdel, originally a guitar tech for Fishbone and Tool, who wrote with a female singer in mind.

Howerdel met Keenan in 1992 and their working relationship has been tumultuous since.

"Anybody who writes songs in their bedroom has a difficult time letting anyone else corrupt them in their opinion, so it was definitely hard to let go of the idea you have in your head and listen to what the other people can bring to it and make it a bigger idea," says Keenan.

"He had these pie-in-the-sky dreams of something. And I was kind of the guy who kicked him out of the nest. He would have been hanging with a female singer in mind for another decade, probably."

The first batch of songs, fleshed out during the late 90s with Freese, original bass player and violinist Paz Lenchantin and guitarist Troy van Leeuwen, ended up on the band's mythically influenced debut album, Mer de Noms.

It was an instant hit with Tool fans, yet unlike that band's hammering noise, A Perfect Circle explored different textures, with an often tender, dreamy effect.

Keenan says the strength of the band's diversity lies in their professionalism.

"If you can listen, then you've got something, and the people I've had the privilege of working with are good at listening. I don't work too well with people who have a specific agenda in mind that has nothing to do with the music. That relationship generally doesn't last for too long."

The name Thirteenth Step is a reference to a dependent relationship, a play on the theme of American rehab culture. Yet Keenan's relationship with the subject is somewhat remote.

He was a close friend of Alice in Chains frontman Lane Staley, whose death in 2002 is believed to have been as a result of heroin use, and has admitted to experimenting with drugs in the past. These days his only indulgence appears to be a passion for wine - his cellar boasts around 2000 bottles and he plans to spend time visiting vineyards while on tour here.

"As artists we're here to report about life in general and I think any situation we can report, if we're worth our talent, will in some way be a metaphor for many things.

"Most people immediately jump to the conclusion that addiction has to do with chemistry, whereas in fact those addictions can run much deeper and have nothing to do with chemicals. Behavioural addictions, psychological addictions etc."

It's easy to see why some people get the wrong idea about A Perfect Circle. Straddling an eerily maudlin, Beatles-ish cover of The Nurse Who Loved Me (a song by van Leeuwen's old band, Failure), are examples of goth-metal, (Vanishing), pop-metal (Blue) and emotionally draining metal (The Noose).

"People tend to latch on to the words 'dark' and 'moody' and I think that's a misrepresentation of what's going on. If I'm trying to tell you a story and I'm describing something and you're sitting in the middle of a McDonald's it's going to be difficult for you to focus in on the details.

"What helps is if you close your eyes. Sometimes people don't remember to close their eyes. So turn the lights off, get people to explore those quieter areas, not the obvious ones."

It might not provide failed AA clients with any hope but you get the impression if everyone subscribed to Keenan's philosophies, the world would be a much deeper, weirder place.

* A Perfect Circle play the Queens Wharf Events Centre, Wellington, on Monday and the North Shore Events Centre on Tuesday.