Tool drummer Danny Carey has shared a new three-minute video detailing the story behind his striking Alex Grey–designed touring drum kit, created in collaboration with Sonor Drums and the visionary artist whose work has long been intertwined with Tool‘s aesthetic.
Grey, of course, has famously contributed artwork to Tool‘s albums Lateralus, 10,000 Days, and Fear Inoculum, as well as the band’s live visuals and merchandise. In the newly shared video, Carey explains how the idea came together and why he wanted his drum kit to become a deeper part of the overall show.
“I’ve had a lot of people ask me about the drum set that I’ve been playing on the last few years,” Carey said. “There’s a guy that’s done a lot of artwork for us named Alex Grey. He’s contributed to our onstage visuals and our album covers for — God — probably 15 years now. He’s done a fantastic job, taking the combination, a synergistic quality of the artwork and blending it with the music.”
Carey explained that the concept was simple: give Grey full creative freedom: “I came up with an idea to have [Alex] do all the artwork on [the drum kit], just to make it more part of the show,” he said. “I didn’t want to tell him what to do.”
To bring the idea to life, Carey worked closely with Sonor to design a high-end kit from the ground up: “I had Sonor make me a really high-quality kit. I got to pick all the woods. The initial kit was beech wood and ebony, which is kind of what the old Sonor drums were made of in the early ’80s.”
The drums were intentionally finished as a blank slate before being sent to Grey’s New York studio: “They just painted ’em white — like a blank canvas — and sent them over from Germany. Then I sent them to New York where Alex‘s chapel and studios are. I just turned him loose on it.”
Grey‘s artwork incorporated many of his signature motifs, but Carey says one piece stood above the rest: “The coup de grâce was he did a gong drum. He surprised me with that. It’s actually a portrait of me and a native hitting a drum. He represented the sound waves going into my ear and then affecting my brain — kind of the process of inspiration.”
Concerned about damaging the original hand-painted kit on tour, Carey later commissioned a second version: “I liked them so much, and I was so worried about damaging ’em, I had Sonor make me another kit,” he explained. “This one’s bubinga and maple instead of ebony and beech.”
That second kit features scanned wraps of Grey‘s original artwork, allowing Carey to preserve the hand-painted drums while still performing with the same visuals onstage: “They’re both amazing pieces of art, and I’m so flattered to have ’em. It was so nice of Alex to do that for me.”
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