Mastodon

If Mastodon’s first album Remission was about fire, 2004’s Leviathan tackled Moby Dick and the element of water and Blood Mountain clambered up the earthy slopes of stardom, then with Crack the Skye Mastodon ventures into the now familiar and musically crowded reaches of the cosmic sphere. But nothing is familiar about Mastodon’s sound except Mastodon themselves; reaching into the depths of frontman Brent Hinds’ near-death experience, the band have conjured up an album that references the magnificence of Led Zeppelin with the morbid malevolence of Black Sabbath.

Wade then, into the murky depths of history and mythology in this Rasputin-meets-Icarus epic as the ominous opening of ”˜Oblivion’ rips into chugging guitars with the kind of tectonic shift of sound that takes this beyond prog. The slow-burning sludge of ”˜Quintessence’ has a bridge that’s strangely reminiscent of Soundgarden, while the title track weaves gorgeous guitar melodies with vocal harmonies, all held together by Dailor’s fluid drumming. But the albums has its truly awesome moments in their two 10-minutes-plus epics ”˜The Czar’ and ”˜The Last Baron,’ full of dense interleaved guitars, Hinds’ Ozzy-esque vocals and tempo changes that could well give you whiplash (hark the cheeky Rush YYZ tribute smack in the middle of ”˜The Last Baron’). Producer Brendan O’Brien (Springsteen, RATM) is responsible for much of the texture of the album, helped by Hind and Bill Kelliher’s breathless guitar work, and Troy Sanders’ perfect bass frills but the day undoubtedly belongs to Dailor whose drumming is a force of nature. Never mind the impenetrable philosophy of the lyrics; with this album Mastodon’s officially declaring its place in the big league and detractors are going to be hard pressed to challenge this tour de force.