Tool’s Maynard James Keenan Opening Arizona Sushi Restaurant

Maynard James Keenan is expanding his Northern Arizona kingdom once again — and this time, there’s no wine pairing required, although you can certainly have one. The Tool and A Perfect Circle frontman will open Queen B Sushi on Sept. 4 in Old Town Cottonwood, Az., adding an upscale Japanese restaurant to the growing hospitality empire he has built in the Verde Valley over the past two decades.

The new restaurant, located at 816 N. Main St., is an extension of the Queen B universe Keenan has developed with his wife, Jennifer. The couple expanded Queen B Vinyl Café into a café and coffee roaster in 2024; the space is now Northern Arizona’s exclusive Record Store Day location and an artist-friendly venue that has hosted or is slated to host performances from Khemmis, Author & Punisher and others.

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Keenan’s connection to sushi goes back nearly four decades. He says he began eating it while living in Boston around 1987, but his first Japanese tour with A Perfect Circle in 2000 transformed that appreciation into something considerably more serious. “It was an eye opening and mind-blowing experience,” Keenan says of that first trip to Japan.

Apparently, the experience stuck. Among his souvenirs were titanium and hardwood travel chopsticks from Snow Peak, which he has carried in his pocket ever since. The chopsticks even became something of a personal calling card. Last year, Keenan ran into comedian Janeane Garofalo at the Chelsea Hotel in New York, where she recalled to David Cross and Dave Hill that one thing she remembered about the musician was that he used to carry chopsticks in his pocket.

“At which point I reached into my pocket and pulled them out,” Keenan says. “Twenty-five years I’ve been carrying these chopsticks. That’s how much I love sushi.”

The culinary operation is being overseen by culinary director and chef Brett Vibber, whose résumé includes Roka Akor locations in London, Hong Kong and the U.S. Vibber recruited Chef Chuhiro “Thomas” Kato, who trained under Nobu Matsuhisa in Beverly Hills and Masaharu Morimoto in New York, and Chef Sheridan “Sher” Chase, an Arizona native who worked in kitchens across California and Texas before returning home.

The sushi concept itself emerged almost accidentally. While developing the menu for Queen B Vinyl Café, the Keenans initially considered a full sushi program before abandoning the idea because, in a town of roughly 12,000, they assumed finding the right chef would be impossible. Then they realized they already had one in Vibber, who was already working with the operation.

Naturally, Queen B Sushi won’t be sending diners into the night thirsty. The restaurant will offer a rotating selection of wines from Keenan’s Caduceus Cellars and Merkin Vineyards.

The restaurant is the latest piece of a Northern Arizona operation that has grown far beyond music. Keenan has spent more than 20 years helping establish the Verde Valley as a wine destination, including successfully campaigning for the region’s AVA certification in 2021. His local footprint began with the Caduceus Cellars Tasting Room in Jerome and expanded to include Merkin Vineyards Hilltop Winery & Trattoria and the seven-acre Caduceus Cellars Hilltop Facility on the site of Cottonwood’s former Masonic Lodge.

On the music front, Keenan will return to the road with A Perfect Circle starting Nov. 25 in Mexico City. Meanwhile, Tool drummer Danny Carey seemed to let the cat out of the bag in February that the band was mulling a Sphere residency in Las Vegas, but no further details have emerged.

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