In news that will likely make your palms sweat just reading it, professional free-climber and certified lunatic Alex Honnold has scaled a 101-storey skyscraper with no ropes, no safety gear, and no fear of God – just one hell of a pump-up soundtrack consisting largely of Tool.
Yep. Tool.
Alex Honnold BEST MOMENTS Free Soloing Taipei 101 | Netflix’s Skyscraper Live
Over the weekend, Honnold scaled Taipei 101 in Taiwan – a 1,667-foot behemoth and the 11th tallest building in the world – as part of a live Netflix event dubbed Skyscraper Live. The whole thing kicked off just after 8pm local time and took him a little over an hour and a half, which somehow feels both insanely fast and horrifyingly long.
Speaking to Variety shortly after reaching the top (alive), Honnold revealed his soundtrack of choice was “rock music I’ve liked my whole life,” adding that it was “mostly Tool.”
“I made the playlist months ago while I was driving,” he confessed. “I’ve been training to it a bunch.”
Because obviously you’d want to rehearse climbing a skyscraper with no safety gear the same way you prep for leg day?
The music wasn’t just for vibes, either. Honnold explained that knowing the length of the songs helped him keep pace while climbing – each section of the building was taking him roughly five to six minutes, so Tool’s long, meditative prog epics basically functioned as a very metal stopwatch.
Although, in peak Honnold energy, he also admitted the music kept cutting out halfway up the building.
“I couldn’t really hear and I was kind of like, ‘Whatever. I’m just doing my thing’,” he said.
Reminder: he was dangling hundreds of metres above the ground at this point.
To recap: a man climbed a 101-storey skyscraper, free-solo, on a live stream, while vibing to Tool, losing audio, and casually shrugging it off. Just another weekend activity for someone whose risk tolerance is set to Maynard apparently?
You can check out highlights from the climb in the viddy above.
Meanwhile, Tool recently wrapped up their long-awaited Australian live return headlining Good Things 2025.
Further Reading
Watch Tool’s Maynard James Keenan Prank Drummer Danny Carey Live Onstage With A Dildo
Watch This Toddler Vibe Out To Tool’s ‘Invincible’
Tool’s Maynard James Keenan Says He Caught Coronavirus In Australia
