Maynard James Keenan Reveals How He Feels After Playing With Legends

Maynard James Keenan talks about how he feels after playing with legendary music bands. Tool, A Perfect Circle, and Puscifer’s frontman explained that he and his team carefully selected a bespoke soundtrack to play to his grapes at his Merkin Vineyards location.
Maynard James Keenan’s thoughts on playing with legendary music bands
This fresh new interview revealed that whereas some grapes grew up listening to Led Zeppelin, AC/DC, and Pink Floyd, others grew up listening to Portishead, Tricky, and Massive Attack.
When Maynard James Keenan appeared on the DannyWimmerPresents podcast, hosted by Matt Pinfield and Josh Bernstein, former MTV host Pinfield brought up the topic of these playlists with the singer, asking him to explain the reasoning behind it, as he thought it was “really interesting.”
Before we get into the interview, Maynard James Keenan announced this week that he would establish an ice cream shop, a restaurant, a vineyard, and his tram line in Arizona, on a hilltop in Old Town Cottonwood, on the site of Masonic Lodge.
Here are the opening hours for Maynard’s shops:
Sundays through Thursdays, 11 a.m. to 8 p.m., and Fridays and Saturdays, 11 a.m. to 10 p.m.
Meanwhile, the Merkin Vineyards Pocket Park Gelateria will be open from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. on Sundays through Thursdays and from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. on Fridays and Saturdays.
Official statement for the Maynard’s shops:
“In the many years, I’ve [Maynard James Keenan] been working towards this moment. One of the things I discovered when it comes to bridging the hurdle of exposing people to Arizona wine is context.
So by putting a place like this in the middle of Cottonwood with five acres of vines, to winery facilities with a full greenhouse, and a full kitchen, all the context becomes visible, and you kind of break down the barriers of whatever preconceptions you have of Arizona wine.”

During the interview, Maynard James Keenan shared his thoughts about legendary music bands:
“During vintage, I choose whole albums to play to the grapes while processing. Some playlists are played year after year to the same fruit. We note what music was played to what grapes, and then these playlists are included with the tasting notes. All whole albums. Played to the new grapes all day on rotation, but not shuffle.
Yeah, when something comes in I have a playlist in mind,” Keenan replies. “Historically, we might have something specific playing to a specific grape, or a block that comes in, we always write it down and then when it comes in next year we’ll look back at the last playlist to see what was playing and try to match that again, so that that wine always has similar music playing when it comes in.”
Matt Pinfield asking a new question to Maynard: “Literally, do you find there is an absolute significance and difference depending on what kind of music is played?”
Maynard answered: “100 per cent, no. It’s just a great story.”
In addition to this, Maynard talked about the legendary music bands like Led Zeppelin, AC/DC, and Pink Floyd, Portishead, Tricky, and Massive Attack:
“It’s overwhelming to be put in the same list with those people. All you can really do is not worry about it. I just kind of do what you do and try to do it the best you can so that you don’t look like a clown next to these superstars.”
You can watch the full Maynard James Keenan on the music he plays for his grapes interview below!