Maynard James Keenan Plays King Diamond And KISS To His Grapes

What’s the most important part of making booze? The ingredients? Maybe. Maturing it at exactly the right temperature? Behave. No, as we learned from Metallica blasting the barrels for their Blackened Whiskey with their songs in order to vibrate the wood and release the natural flavours (or something), the secret pixie dust is: music.

To Arizona, where Tool/A Perfect Circle/Puscifer man Maynard James Keenan has been busy acting as DJ to his grapes. The lucky fruit from Merkin Vineyards for his Caduceus Cellars wines are treated to various sounds as they grow, in order to [wine stuff] to their flavours. He recently revealed to Discogs that, among others, they’re treated to albums by King Diamond, Pink Floyd, KISS, AC/DC and other rock-tacular stuff.

"During vintage, I choose whole albums to play to the grapes while processing,” Maynard says. “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.”

If you want to crib this info from Maynard for your own home-brew, Discogs also have a chart of which grape is played particular songs. Oddly for a playlist for wine-ing, there’s no songs by [band name redacted because we’re being nice].

READ THIS: The many faces of Maynard James Keenan