Albums•November 29, 2011•15,374 views

Mastodon Blood Mountain

01. Wolf Is Loose 02. Crystal Skull 03. Sleeping Giant 04. Capillarian Crest 05. Circle of Cysquatch 06. Bladecatcher 07. Colony of Birchmen 08. Hunters of the Sky 09. Hand of Stone 10. This Mortal Soil 11. Siberian Divide 12. Pendulous Skin

2006 Warner Bros. Records

Our score 6

by Cory

10/9/2006

Mastodon may very well be the most important band in metal today. It's definitely what most critics would have us believe and it seems to be what the band themselves believe these days. I can't think of any other way to account for the kind of self-indulgence that plagues this record from beginning to end. Apparently they're even taking lessons in indulgence from album guests Josh Homme (Queens of the Stone Age), Cedric Bixler-Zavala (The Mars Volta) and Scott Kelly (Neurosis). From front to back, Mastodon's latest, Blood Mountain, is an alternating display of talent and ego and this time around, the band's lack of restraint and vocal juggling have sunk what could have otherwise been a great record. Since Mastodon themselves apparently have no interest in revisiting their most metal days of Remission and Lifesblood, it doesn't make much sense to compare this latest phase to that one. Instead, I'd rather focus on this record itself as well as the growth exhibited and unfortunate departures from 2004's Leviathan. With that album's release, Mastodon stepped out from under the extreme metal veil to reinvent themselves as a more rock-oriented act. With Blood Mountain, they've embraced prog in all its bloated glory and found a way to make it work on occassion. The opener "The Wolf Is Loose" might start off uncharacteristically thrashy for Mastodon, but once the cleaner vocals kick in, you get an idea of where the album might be going. The track is one of a few personal highlights for me personally, but feels almost like a copout in terms of the rest of the disc, something to placate the metal fans. A neat little bit of drumming kicks off "Crystal Skull" which features guest vocals from Neurosis' Scott Kelly. It's definitely got some decent riffing but at the end of the day, this song kinda just sounds like Mastodon ripping themselves off. It's a rehash of "Blood and Thunder" in a handful of ways and it doesn't really work here the way it did on Leviathan. "Sleeping Giant" is the beginning of the experimental side of things that dominates the rest of the album. Loads of clean guitar playing riffs that could've been lifted from Rush or Yes wind their way around until the song finally gets going after two minutes. They just won't let the songs get any amount of momentum though and after a couple of lines, the song dies down again. The vocal line also lacks any significant variation and the track just becomes a bore before it can really grab you. It even has some godawful spoken word bits. "Capillarian Crest" features some of the disc's most intricate riffing, which might be a bonus for some, but the song's obsession with its own technicality just becomes too much. Mastodon don't seem to care at all about writing a song so much as they do about cramming as many riffs, fills and parts into five minutes as possible. There's just a lot of bits and pieces without anything to hold them all together. Is it impressive to listen to at times Yes. Does it make a good record Hardly. This particular track also features the band's attempt to rip Mike Patton's vocal stylings. The vocal inconsistency is definitely one of Mastodon's biggest flaws at the moment. Every time someone sings on this record, it's a different voice and a different style. I know vocals have never been the band's strong point, but if they found a way to create a stronger vocal presence, it might keep these songs from falling off the deep end. The opening riff of "Circle of Cysquatch" (and in fact, most of the song) was one of the few moments that actually felt like the metal band that held so much promise five years ago. This is just a fun track that flows well and actually works right up until it hits a brick wall and a robot starts singing. Every time I heard this song, I seriously dug it right up to that point. The overdone vocal effect kicks in and the end of the song slows down and falls apart too. "Bladecatcher" should be entered into a contest for "Most Obnoxious Song of the Millenium," with its sissified intro riffs giving way to jarbled crap that sounds like the Tazmanian Devil being raped by a theremin. Then Bill Kelliher plays his scales for a while before the whole nightmare starts over again. If this is your idea of amazing music, I pity you. One of the few times that the whole new rock aesthetic works for Mastodon is during "Colony of the Birchmen" when Josh Homme guests and reminds us all what Neil Fallon's guest appearance on Leviathan did: Mastodon have no vocal identity. The song's not bad at all, but there's just no identifiable character to the vocals that makes them unique, interesting or even likable. The hooks of this track make it one of the more memorable songs on Blood Mountain, but once it ends, it's pretty much all downhill. Strip away the drumming and amped-up aggression and "Hunters of the Sky" is just a mediocre rock song posing as metal. "Hand of Stone" starts promisingly enough but slowly begins under its own weight. There's just too much happening to be cohesive and the metal chugging in the track's final seconds can't save it. The disc's last three tracks "This Mortal Soil," "Siberian Divide" and "Pendelous Skin" are among the most experimental and are honestly the point at which I would urge anyone still listening to press "stop." "This Mortal Soil" sounds like anything and everything from Faith No More to Dredg to Rush to Black Sabbath. It's a shitty genre-bender that drags on forever before a stock Mastodon riff at the three and a half minute mark sweeps in and tries to tie it all together. "Siberian Divide" brings back the crappy prog verse to heavy chorus motif that they established early on but this time with even more disatrous results as the riffs just beome, for the first time on Blood Mountain, basic. "Pendelous Skin" is the album-closing psychedelic ballad from hell. It's an intriguing departure for Mastodon, but it ends up as more of a failed experiment than a gutsy risk. One of the few areas in which Mastodon have been consistently impressive is the quality of their albums unrelated to music. The production on this disc is fantastic, as usual and the artwork is beautifully handled yet again. If only their music were as consistent, they'd be the saviours of metal that most major media outlets would have you think they are. One final note: The disc's "hidden track" manages to top even the most annoying portions of the record itself, presenting the listener with a faux fan letter from Josh Homme concerning his contributions to the record. Don't even bother fast-forwarding through the 17 minutes of dead space to get to it. It's not worth it. Bottom Line: I'm not prepared to write off Mastodon completely, but Blood Mountain is just lacking in the songwriting and vocals department. I understand that Mastodon's individual members are immensely talented but it has become increasingly rare that their talents all work together at the same points. This is the kind of album that only a musician could truly appreciate, both because of its musicianship and because of its lack of appeal to anyone looking for anything else in their music. Are Mastodon one of the most talented metal bands in the world Almost definitely. Does Blood Mountain showcase that talent in a digestable or even enjoyable way Rarely.

126 comments

Post Comment

Drew_ 9/19/2006 3:17:53 PM

good album.

Mastodon Blood Mountain

126 comments

Related Links

Mastodon Album Reviews

Top News This Week