As many fans have known or decades, TOOL’s music can take you to higher. In the case of extreme climber Alex Honnold, we mean this literally — over the weekend, the daredevil completed a 101-story ascent of the Taipei 101 building in Tapei, Taiwan with the alt-metal greats blasting in his earbuds.
The climb took place over the weekend, and was broadcast as Netflix’s Skyscraper Live special. The day found Honnold performing his ropes-free ascent live for a global audience, which he accomplished in just over an hour-and-a-half. His feat broke a record for being the biggest free solo climb of an urban structure.
The celebrated rock climber — a 30-year veteran, and the subject of the 2018 Oscar-winning documentary Free Solo — later explained to Variety that he had TOOL songs flooding a playlist he’d prepped to pump him up during the climb. That said, he admitted that technical difficulties meant he couldn’t hear some of his song choices whilst cruising up the Taipei 101, and likewise lost contact with his team.
“It was mostly TOOL. It’s a random playlist that I made, that I shared with production. I made it months ago while I was driving,” he said, adding, “I’ve been training to it a bunch. Basically, rock music that I’ve liked my whole life. Part of the appeal of music is that actually it helps me with pacing.
“Each bamboo box had been taking me about five to six and a half minutes. I just know how long the songs are. So, it gives you a sense of if you’re going fast or slow. But in this case, it all kept cutting out anyway, and I couldn’t really hear and I was kind of like, ‘Whatever. I’m just doing my thing.’”
While Honnold didn’t mention any TOOL songs by name, we reckon he might’ve had a “Jambi”-esque “king’s mountain view” from the top of the Taipei 101.