Today marks 114 days since Tool announced they’d returned to the studio to work on a follow up to 2006’s 10, 000 Days. Since then, a multitude of updates surrounding where the band could potentially be at with new music have left fans confused to say the least.

Before you give up hope entirely, the band have now taken to Facebook over the weekend to reveal that bassist Justin Chancellor has in fact been making “great progress” with recording.

“JUSTIN’S bass setup in the studio. Sounds like he is making great progress recording in “a great studio” said the band in a post.

During the band’s string of recent live dates, frontman Maynard Keenan has begun “begging” his bandmates to hurry along with the album. Keenan’s speech during the band’s set at Northern Invasion festival included him explaining why he’d begun wearing riot gear onstage, saying it’s because he’s afraid of fans eventually losing their patience in a rather violent manner.

“A lot of people recently have been asking me, Maynard James Keenan, what’s with the fucking riot gear?” he began. “Well, I’ll tell you. I’m afraid of bananas, and other forms of fruit, because eventually you wonderful people are going to run out of fucking patience.”

“So I beg you – Danny, Adam, and Justin, please finish your parts so I can finish mine. So I can take this fucking riot gear off.”

Last week, Tone Deaf reported that Justin apparently cryptically revealed their upcoming album release date to a fan at the Cleveland leg of their current slew of music workshops. A Reddit user prophesized that the album could be out by December this year, lining up a series of clues and hints.

Check out Tool’s most recent single, ‘Jambi’, from 2007: