Tool and Queens of the Stone Age announce fall 2023 gigs in Twin Cities

The Twin Cities' concert fall 2023 calendar just got a lot louder and heavier, as both Tool and Queens of the Stone Age announced gigs in town.

Tool will return to Xcel Energy Center on Halloween night, Oct. 31, the latest in a long line of typically packed arena dates by the arty metal quartet. Tickets go on sale Friday at 10 am. via Ticketmaster, with presale options for Tool Army members starting Thursday. Prices were not revealed but probably will be just a bit more than last year's show at Target Center, when seats went for $57-$147.

Ever-enigmatic frontman Maynard James Keenan and his crescendoing bandmates were making up COVID-canceled tour dates last year that were originally booked following the release of their last album, 2019's "Fear Inoculum." Considering they put out records only about once every decade, fans no doubt won't complain about them coming around again to tout that LP.

Queens of the Stone Age confirmed a Sept. 17 date at the Armory as part of a fall tour that also includes a headlining set at Chicago's Riot Fest two nights before Minneapolis. Tickets for the Armory gig also go on sale Friday at 10 a.m. via Ticketmaster at prices TBA, with presale options starting Tuesday.

Josh Homme and QOTSA have lined up a couple fun openers for that leg of the tour: anarchic Swedish punk band Viagra Boys and a solo Jehnny Beth, best known from the British post-punk band Savages.

Homme and his crew came to town twice during their last major U.S. tour in 2017, when they played both the mercifully sidelined Roy Wilkins Auditorium that October and then came back and hit the Palace Theatre in December. The fall 2023 tour was announced Tuesday ahead of next week's release of their first album in six years, "In Times New Roman… ." Here's the first single, "Emotion Sickness," posted below.