Tool have begun working on their long-awaited follow-up to the 10,000 Days album and we just got another piece of the puzzle. Thanks to an Instagram post from Adam Jones, we now know that the band will be working with producer Joe Barresi, or Evil Joe Barresi as they prefer to call him, on their upcoming disc.

The band is currently in pre-production on the new album and having Barresi on board brings a familiar face to the fold. In the posting, Jones joked that the band's first choice was Phil Spector, but "he has other conflicting work obligations." See the post below.

Barresi has a history with the band. Though Tool were listed as the producers on 10,000 Days, Barresi was on hand and credited with the engineering and mixing for the album. He's also previously worked with Maynard James Keenan on Puscifer's V Is for Vagina release. His credits also include work with Chevelle, Bad Religion, the Melvins, Queens of the Stone Age, Avenged Sevenfold and more.

It has all been building to this moment since Danny Carey told Loudwire that the band would "definitely" put out a new record this year. Reports then started surfacing from rockers like Tom Morello, Behemoth's Nergal, Buzz Osborne of the Melvins and Sebastian Bach, who had confirmed they had heard the new music, giving credence to Carey's promise (which had come up empty in other years). In January, Jones said the music was done and last month, Maynard James Keenan made it known that he had finished the lyrics to "all but one" of the songs, as he was waiting for the final version of that last track.

Those hoping for a little Christmas in July will have to endure without the new Tool album, however. Keenan recently revealed that it would not be released in the summer, but he remained mum on disclosing another potential time when it could finally see the light of day.

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