See 9-Year-Old Tool Fan Play 15 Clean Riffs with Guitar Gifted by Adam Jones
Kids these days are really showing off some impressive musical chops. Nine-year-old Tool fan and guitarist Maya Neelakantan is wowing yet again with a new video playing clean riffs of 15 of the band's complex songs.
Loudwire first caught wind of her gifts earlier this summer when the budding talent released a video of her nailing an epic 16-minute rendition of Tool's opus "7empest" from their Fear Inoculum album. She said at the time, "It was an incredible journey for me when learning the entire 16 minutes of mind blowing melodies and solos. I feel [Tool guitarist] Adam Jones, my favorite guitarist, really shines throughout the song. I hope you all enjoy it!"
That video naturally went viral, and when Jones saw it, he was so impressed he gifted the young protege with one of his Gibson Signature 1979 Les Paul Custom guitars for her to continue slaying. If you haven't seen the reaction video yet, it'll add some joy to your day.
Just when we finally got the chills to go away from her "7empest" take, Neelakantan is making hairs stand on end again with her latest massive undertaking, using that very same gifted guitar to put together a master medley of 15 of Tool's epic hits in a new YouTube video.
The jam session includes "Intension," which she opens with, as well as "Lateralus," "Descending," "Vicarious," "Pneuma" and "Third Eye" among others and she includes a bit of "7empest" again too.
In the YouTube post she shares, "I have put together 15 Tool songs and made it into one BIG song! It took a lot of time and process to come up with this and I am very happy with the final result! ... I just love everything that Adam Jones does! This video only explored the clean (without distortion) melodies that he created and I can't wait to explore everything else even more!"
Neelakantan adds to the leagues of young talents that are proving rock and metal have a great future, also including pre-teen drummer extraordinaire Nandi Bushell who is becoming a near household name after drumoffs with Dave Grohl and being invited to play at the Taylor Hawkins tribute show. There's also 10-year-old Harper who blew away America's Got Talent with her fantastic Spiritbox cover and the kids rocking Rage Against the Machine giving a look at the new generation of rock stars.