You wouldn't describe TOOL as the most prolific recording band in rock. Why, their latest album, "Fear Inoculum," which came out earlier this fall, took longer to record than the combined efforts to map the human genome.

"What can I say? We're kooks," remarked vocalist Maynard James Keenan.

Actually, Keenan didn't say that — to me, anyway — but they ARE sorta nutty and intense. The point is, "Fear Inocumum" is a massive work of much greatness — certainly one of the best recordings of 2019 — and don't ask me to describe it any more than you'd ask a bee to analyze how and why honey is created.

But wait! In 2012, I did attempt to describe TOOL's sound in a review of their appearance at the Mohegan Sun Arena that January. That show was one of the most intense musical experiences I've ever seen and heard, and I feebly wrote, "(TOOL) songs are extended cerebral pieces that are the proggy art-metal equivalent of an enraged mathematical genius who shrieks, in an odd time signature, an ongoing succession of prime numbers that never ends.

"But it's the visual component, thanks to the band's individual and collective obsession with the possibilities of music video, performance art, neon laser/vari-lite fractals and futuristic cinema, that moves everything to a new experiential level."

"Fear Inoculum" is a very different TOOL album than anything they've done before, and why shouldn't it be? Guaranteed: TOOL's Thursday concert at Mohegan Sun will be one of the finest rock performances you'll ever see. I just hope you bring your head back safely.

TOOL, 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Mohegan Sun Arena; with Killing Joke; $79-$150; 1-800-745-3000.