The highly praised and often misunderstood American prog-rock band Tool have recently released their music to Spotify and other streaming services. This has been a huge decision that’s calmed most fans down a little in the days leading up to the release of their long anticipated (13 years) fifth studio album “Fear Inoculum”. It’s such a big deal that they now hold all top ten spots on the billboard charts with songs spanning their entire catalog. Their albums are not really formatted for random streaming though. They are works of art that are meant to be played from beginning to end. For the most part this isn’t a big problem except for a couple of instances.

The main instance that is growing into a problem would be Parabol/Parabola. On the album they are only separated by the track list numbering system. Why is it separated to begin with is a rabbit hole we won’t venture down for now. The two are obviously one track that act as a “Parabola” would. I will use this example from an online essay about how the album Laturalus relates to Buddhism by “Matt”. “ In an interesting note, a parabola is defined as, “a curve, any point of which is equally distant from a fixed point, called the focus, and a straight line, called the directrix” (http://www.brainydictionary.com/words/pa/parabola199305.html With this information it becomes apparent that Parabol and Parabola work as if the songs were on an actual parabola: Parabol is a slow, calm song that eventually works its way to Parabola, which is a faster, louder song. Therefore, Parabol may represent the line on a parabola that makes its way to the vertex (Parabola) and eventually goes down, much like Parabola calms down at the end, sounding similar to the original calm song that started the parabola, Parabol.“

There are a number of other tracks that blend so perfectly together that they seem like one track but this is probably the most notable instance. I mean just look at the names and listen to the lyrics. It is very frustrating to hear the transition beginning to happen and it doesn’t. The song stops at a crucial part and then some random song by another band begins to play. It’s a very unfulfilling feeling. We would just like to ask that these “two” songs be recognized as one, as they should be. The band nor service would not take a noticeable financial hit by doing this but they might gain a considerable amount of respect. We understand that respect doesn’t pay the bills but neither does having music available for streaming. From the band’s view this really shouldn’t be an issue but we really never know with this particular group of guys. As for the streaming services? I think you guys will be ok by combining two songs into one. The hit might mean one less donut tomorrow morning but you will surely make that up by lunchtime.