Mastodon - Crack The Skye[Review]

Hello everyone. I’m gonna review the new album Crack The Skye by the band Mastodon.

On this record, Mastodon are leaving their old Sludge Metal sound from the old albums Remissions, Leviathan and Blood Mountain and instead making an amazing Progressive Metal record with lots of energy and power.

Album art(by Paul Romano):


Singles:

1. Divinations

2. Oblivion


Band:
Troy Sanders - vocals, bass


Brent Hinds - vocals, guitar, banjo


Bill Kelliher - guitar


Brann Dailor - drums, percussion, vocals


Guest musicians appearing on the album:

Scott Kelly(Neurosis) - vocals on “Crack The Skye”


Producer: Brendan O’ Brien


Now let’s get to the review!

1. Oblivion
The strong album opener. The song starts with an awesome riff which changes around the 40th second. After about a minute Troy Sanders begins singing the verse with his very special voice which has become one of the trademarks of Mastodon. Brent Hinds sings the vocals on the chorus and i’m really surprised by how amazing his vocals are. His vocals is truly one of the things I love about this record. The song carries on this way until the guitar solo kicks in… And what a guitar solo! I think it’s one of the highlights of the record! The song is overall truly magnificent and special and a heck of an album opener!
10/10

2. Divinations
Divinations is the lead single of the album and that takes a lot of power. And this song has it! It opens with an awesome chicken-picking intro on banjo. The vocals are done by Brent Hinds who once again shows his talent as a musician. The song has a god damn cool guitar solo with a lot of power. As i said earlier, this song is very powerful, the most powerful on the record.
9.5/10

3. Quintessence
A special song. It contains a lot of cool riffs and a special voice once again provided by Brent Hinds. It has a VERY catchy chorus with Troy Sanders on the vocals once again, doing a magnificent job. It doesn’t have a guitar solo and contains mostly a lot of repeats but have some really cool interludes.
9/10

4. The Czar: I. Usurper II. Escape III. The Martyr IV. Spiral
One of the absolute best on the record. It is a pearl. The song starts with a cool intro and Brent Hinds on vocals. The song is splitten up in 4 different parts which you can see on the name. It is mostly shifts between riffs and melody changes all through the song. Still it remains very catchy and is one of the best progressive metal songs I have ever heard.
The lyrics is, as said by the band on the Special Edition DVD about the evil and all the bad things going on in the world.
Ultra awesome song with some of the best parts of the album!
10/10

5. Ghost Of Karelia
Ghost Of Karelia is a song with a lot of great riffs a good melody. The song hadn’t catched me as the other songs on the album to start with. But the song is really a masterpiece and because of the good melody it didn’t took me a long time to like it. It isn’t as good as the other songs, but it really is a masterpiece too.
8.9/10

6. Crack The Skye(featuring Scott Kelly)
The song is a homage to Brann Dailor’s sister Skye Dailor who commited suicide at the age of 14. The song features Scott Kelly on vocals who also featured on the song “Crystal Skull” on their 2006 album Blood Mountain.
Brann Dailor has stated:
"My sister passed away when I was a teenager and it was awful, and there's no better way to pay tribute to a lost loved one than having an opportunity to be in a group with my friends and we make art together. Her name was Skye, so Crack the Skye means a lot of different things. For me personally, it means the moment of being told you lost someone dear to you. That moment is enough to crack the sky."
The song is very catchy like all the others and very enjoyable.
9/10

7. The Last Baron
The final track of the record. And Oh… My… God! It’s amazing! Just like The Czar, this song is one of the greatest Progressive Metal songs i have ever heard. 13 minutes of awesome riffs and Brent Hinds’s magnificent voice. The melody is once again great and as said before: The Last Baron and The Czar are the two shining pearls of the record!
10/10

Story:
Brann Dailor has said this about the story of the album(taken from an interview:

"There is a paraplegic and the only way that he can go anywhere is if he astral travels. He goes out of his body, into outer space and a bit like Icarus, he goes too close to the sun, burning off the golden umbilical cord that is attached to his solar plexus. So he is in outer space and he is lost, he gets sucked into a wormhole, he ends up in the spirit realm and he talks to spirits telling them that he is not really dead. So they send him to the Russian cult, they use him in a divination and they find out his problem. They decide they are going to help him. They put his soul inside Rasputin's body. Rasputin goes to usurp the czar and he is murdered. The two souls fly out of Rasputin's body through the crack in the sky(e) and Rasputin is the wise man that is trying to lead the child home to his body because his parents have discovered him by now and think that he is dead. Rasputin needs to get him back into his body before it's too late. But they end up running into the Devil along the way and the Devil tries to steal their souls and bring them down…there are some obstacles along the way."

My opinion on the record overall:
This album can be described with a lot of words. Unbelievable, magnificent, amazing, awesome, mind blowing etc. This record is a masterpiece! I have listened to Progressive Metal like Dream Theater, Anubis Gate and Symphony X but I have never got the same feel as with this album. I picked up the Special Edition of the album at my local CD store and started listening when I got home. It was amazing. I knew a bit of it from the Divinations song and the download of the album I had on my computer but i hadn’t expected such an awesome album! It’s far by the best Progressive Metal I have EVER heard! It’s the pearl of Progressive Metal in my book. I think this might be the best album of this decade. Well, I don’t know which albums coming out next year, but by the looks of this year’s CD lineup I don’t see any real competition. I know Stratovarius is coming out with one this year, and I have heard about a possible new Iron Maiden album next year, but despite that I still think this is the one. It’s the greatest album I have owned and I don’t regret buying it.
10/10 (but still i would love to give it a 1000/10! )

Buy your copy of the album NOW! I DEMAND YOU:
http://mastodonrocks.com/merch/music

www.mastodonrocks.com

Tell me what you think!

wow that rocked!! you really know how to write a review man! Mastodon are not one of the bands i listen to often but i'll give it a try. their album must be really good as moest of my friends discuss about it a lot.

NightwalkerRicku wrote:

wow that rocked!! you really know how to write a review man! Mastodon are not one of the bands i listen to often but i'll give it a try. their album must be really good as moest of my friends discuss about it a lot.

Wow, thanks man! I'm glad you liked it!
Yeah, I really think you should give it a try.
Try looking up some of their songs on YouTube before buying it.

This just backs up further the fact that I HAVE to listen to this

great review

PowerMetalLivesOn wrote:

This just backs up further the fact that I HAVE to listen to this

great review

Haha!
Thanks.