Maynard James Keenan's Sessanta tour in Phoenix: Here's what - and who - you'll see on stage

Maynard James Keenan is bringing a tour celebrating his 60th birthday to Talking Stick Resort Amphitheatre in Phoenix for two nights, the second of which is his actual 60th birthday — Wednesday, April 17.

The tour is called Sessanta because it’s Italian for 60.

The concerts feature members of A Perfect Circle, Puscifer and Primus not only sharing a stage, but joining each other's performances as the night unfolds with all three bands onstage for the duration of the concert.

It's a sequel of sorts to Cinquanta (Italian for 50), a 50th birthday celebration Keenan threw himself at the Greek Theatre in Griffith Park, Los Angeles, with members of A Perfect Circle, Puscifer and Failure.

We caught up with Keenan, who rose to fame as the singer for Tool in the '90s and became a celebrated winemaker after leaving L.A. for Jerome, Arizona, to talk about the tour before he'd sorted out the details at rehearsal or released the three-song tour EP, “Sessanta E.P.P.P.”

This is what he had to say.

Maynard James Keenan on life as a rock star turning 60

How does it feel to be turning 60?

My ribs hurt.

Do they?

Yeah, I pulled my ribs somehow yesterday. But yeah, (expletive) like that. You stand up from bed and your knee pops out. And you're like, "I didn't really do anything. Why is that?"

Does it feel like your relationship to what you do has changed much as you've gotten older?

I think it's a better relationship, just figuring out more efficient ways to go about writing, to go about sharing, to go about recording, especially with things progressing with technology. It's just better all around.

In that the technology makes different ways of collaborating possible?

Absolutely. Just in general, being able to get your ideas out. It used to be you'd spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to go to a studio. And you're kind of writing in a rehearsal space that smells like wet socks and beer. Now I can write in the hotel room.

I can see where that would be a better situation. And this tour is a bit of an extension of what you did with the 50th birthday concerts?

Yeah, absolutely. The rotation where one band will play a few songs and then the next band plays a few songs. It's gonna be fun.

The logistics of A Perfect Circle, Puscifer and Primus sharing a stage

And how does the sharing of band members work?

Well, it depends on the song. That's what we're going to rehearsals now to determine, having other special guests on a song or guesting on each other's songs. That will just come down to logistics and what makes sense while we're rehearsing.

You're obviously in A Perfect Circle and Puscifer. Will you be sitting in with Primus, too?

It's hard to say. Once we get into rehearsals, we'll figure out what songs they're actually doing. I don't even know.

There's that poster that says all three bands on stage at the same time. That's not for the length of the concert, is it?

Yes.

So if there's a song going on that you're not taking part in, are you just hanging out on stage at that point?

Yeah, there's couches. We might be sharing cake. We're all on stage.

Oh, nice. I saw a quote from Les Claypool where he said, 'What a glorious notion of combining three bands that all start with the letter P.' Was that at all a factor in having Primus on there, that they start with a P as well?

No, it just ended up being accidental, honestly. We had tried to approach a couple other bands. It basically comes down to logistics. Who's touring? Who's writing? Who's even willing to do a thing like this?

Who are the other bands that you approached?

Pixies but they were touring right at the same time. A couple others. The names escape me at the moment.

I was thinking Primus might have been a choice because you have a relationship with Tim Alexander. Is that how they became involved?

Absolutely. I was gonna try to get him down anyway. And Les and (Primus guitarist) Larry (LaLonde) and Tim are all very open-minded. They've jammed with a lot of different people. Les' relationship with Mr. (Sean) Lennon makes sense. Some of his other projects. It just seemed to fit right.

I saw an Instagram post where you said, 'We may even play new songs.' Have you written new songs with these concerts in mind? Or do you plan on writing new songs?

There's an EP. We basically each did a song I had been working on in Logic, just kind of getting songs in the folder, getting my head around the process of using Logic, and I ended up with 60 things in the folder. I started developing them further and realized, 'Oh, this kind of sounds like a Primus song. This kind of sounds like a Puscifer song. This sounds like A Perfect Circle song.'

So we each recorded them individually and they're all gonna be on the same EP available at the concert. I think there's only, like, a handful at each show that are available. And then we're gonna probably sell them online on the actual tour website.

You're also releasing recordings of that 50th birthday concert. Did putting these concerts together inspire you to circle back to those recordings?

They're coming out now because it just took forever to get our (expletive) together. They've been bumbling around and we kind of mixed them, then we forgot about them. Then, we come back around to them and other things happened. COVID. My other three bands released albums. We just kind of lost track of it. Then last year, it was ready to go but we were like, "We might as well just wait 'til the 60th birthday party."

What's next for Keenan's bands A Perfect Circle, Puscifer and Tool?

These are A Perfect Circle's first live shows since 2018. How does it feel to be getting back together with those guys?

I think it's gonna be fun. It was in the past. Like I said, rehearsals are starting pretty soon. So we're blowing the dust off.

With all those song ideas you got together to arrive at these new songs you did for this EP, have you given any thought to getting either A Perfect Circle or Puscifer back into the studio or wherever you'd like to record?

I mean, that's always happening. There's always folders of stuff we're working on. It's just a matter of setting aside the time to do it, to finish it off. But all those things are on the table. Always. That's what we do.

There's obviously been a lot of talk surrounding Tool recording a new album. How are things going on that front?

As you know, I wait for them to tell me that there's something to discuss. Then I'm all ears.

So it hasn't gotten to the point where you're adding to the creative process yet?

I'm not even gonna say a word about it. Because if I even mention a syllable, that's the whole article and my 60th birthday party gets a sidenote, right?

Why Keenan opened a fried chicken restaurant in Arizona

I hear you just opened a new fried chicken place in Cottonwood.

Oh, yeah.

What can you tell me about that?

That it's delicious and you should drive north and check it out. It's a little Southwestern twist on hot chicken.

Keenan's chicken: This Arizona rock star makes killer fried chicken. Now he's selling it with wine pairings

What inspired you to open a chicken place?

Mead, to be honest. I was making mead right around COVID lockdown. I'd had a bunch of honey wines and people kind of overdo them. They age them in a whiskey barrel. They add cherries and blueberries and a bunch of garbage. I just wanted to try an actual honey wine to see what it was like. So I dove in. We made the first one. It was delicious. I ended up carbonating it and putting in a Puscifer can, so it's a Puscifer Queen Bee Mead.

Then once we tried it, the first thought that I had was that it would pair perfectly with my fried chicken recipe. So I started experimenting with that, kind of pairing them together to see if that worked and it was delicious. So that's why we're doing the chicken actually, because of the mead.

Sessanta will have special guests and birthday cake for Maynard

Is there anything else about the birthday concerts that you think people should know?

I think it's just strap in because it's probably not something you're used to. You're used to an opening band, maybe another opener. And then the headliners. It's not laid out like that. It's much more festive. And the rotation, if we do it right. We pulled it off on Cinquanta. It was pretty flawless. So hopefully we can do it this time. It's a different setup a little bit from last time, but it's gonna be fun.

When you talked about sofas and cake and being on stage with the other bands even when you're not performing, is the idea to make it feel more like a party than a concert up there?

Both. I think you can have both, right? A concert party. Party concert.

Sure. It sounds like a great time.

It's gonna be fun. We'll have special guests and people you didn't expect to be up there. Can't really nail anybody down. Because if I say it out loud, then they'll have a dentist appointment and they won't show up. Musicians are flaky like that. So I can't really announce special guests.

But you anticipate there there could be special guests in assorted cities on the tour.

Oh, yeah, absolutely. That's the plan.

Maynard James Keenan's Sessanta concerts

When: 7:30 p.m. Tuesday and Wednesday, April 16-17.

Where: Talking Stick Resort Amphitheatre, 2121 N. 83rd Ave., Phoenix.

Admission: $48.75 and up.

Details: 602-254-7200, livenation.com.

Reach the reporter at ed.masley@arizonarepublic.com. Follow him on X @EdMasley.

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This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Sessanta tour 2024: What to know about Perfect Circle/Primus concerts