Album Review: eMOTIVe by A Perfect Circle

Deliberately released on America's election day, A Perfect Circle's third album mostly comprises reworkings of familiar songs, alongside a couple of the band's own pieces designed to chime with the overall concept of "songs about war, peace, love and greed". The predominant mood is brooding and threatening, like vast storm clouds massing, with the exception of the touching a cappella version of Joni Mitchell's The Fiddle and the Drum, which closes the disc. The opener, by contrast, is a spine-chilling revamp of Crucifix's Annihilation, intoned in an apocalyptic whisper by vocalist Maynard James Keenan.

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When Tool frontman Maynard James Keenan covered Wings' "Silly Love Songs" as a guest vocalist for the Replicants, it was amusing and well thought out. When Tool covered "No Quarter" in concert it was intense, appropriate, and staggeringly good. And when Maynard continued the tradition with the beautiful recording of Failure's "The Nurse Who Loved Me," it became apparent that Maynard had a penchant for re-recording songs that were of high quality but not necessarily anthems.

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