I don't know what happened here. I really don't.
Blood Mountain was a testament to what modern metal could be (I still don't know what to call Mastodon's style, so 'modern metal' is just gonna have to be the big catch-all until I think of an appropriate title), and while each successive Mastodon release got a little bit less heavy (nothing was going to top the sheer weight of Remission, as flawed as the album may be), they were inventive and interesting and, most importantly, fantastic songwriters. They could take all these elements I'd normally abhor and somehow craft very infectious and memorable tunes around them.
I really admired that ability, and no amount of overexposure or radio play is going to make me enjoy Blood Mountain or Leviathan less. But the truth is, when Crack the Skye first came out, it pissed me off so much that I didn't listen to Mastodon at all for nearly four years. From the release date of this fourth album until the day I started this series, I didn't intentionally listen to a single note from this band. Yes, Crack the Skye is really that fucking bad. All the kind of eccentric proggy elements I wasn't fond of but could appreciate how they made them blend with everything else before have taken center stage, and instead of aggressive barnburners and strong, catchy melodies and choruses, we are now inundated with long, spacy prog jams, and endless slow tapping melodies and 100% Mudvayne vocals.
It blows my mind how they could have spent their first three albums constantly refining their sound, perfecting the little details and carving out their own specific niche, just to reach this point and go 'You know what? Fuck all that, we want a more intelligent audience, so let's just drop the heavy influences we have and instead focus on Genesis and Dream Theater and the light Opeth songs'. I'm not crying because they changed (hell, every previous album was distinctly different from its predecessor), I'm crying because the change they made sucks like a turbocharged hoover.
This reminds me a lot of what happened with Norwegian black metal hellions, 1349, with their fourth album (released two months after this here), Revelations of the Black Flame. Almena method pdf. Both bands had started off pretty raw and unrefined and then nailed their particular sound on their third albums, and then for their fourth had apparently just decided that they needed a change and completely abandoned what they were good at. 1349 did not play to their strengths by abandoning the frantically brutal and straightforward black metal and instead focusing on ambient, and Mastodon did not play to their strengths by abandoning the punchy heaviness and strong, hardnosed aggression and melody by instead focusing on longwinded and melodic prog rock. Mastodon taking a huge influence from Pink Floyd and King Crimson seems interesting at first, but when you actually hear it in action it just ends up horrendously depressing.
A band as frantic and energetic as this just doesn't translate well to this laid back style of songwriting. The band never lets loose like they're so good at doing, and even Durgha spends all of his time in the background just giving very simple backing beats as opposed to the nigh endless showboating he's so well known for. So the flair is toned down and it's a lot less showy, that doesn't necessarily mean it's inherently bad, right? Most of the time, sure, but here it's proven pretty early on that when Mastodon wanders outside of their established home base, they just end up lost and confused and have no idea what in the hell they're doing. All seven tracks here just kind of meander about without much cohesion between the individual instruments or the vocals.
And oh yeah, the vocals are at their all time worst at this point. Not only is the Mudvayne voice the only real vocal lead (I still don't know which member sounds like individually, sue me, they're all similar), but it's also more nasally than ever before. It's like he has a dastardly head cold that they couldn't wait to heal because they'd already booked the studio time. The perplexingly popular 'Oblivion' is a perfect showcase for such an issue, as that damn chorus repeats itself seemingly dozens of times, and his voice just grates and grates and grates and oh god make him stop Jesus Christ it's making my liver hurt somehow.
I don't know what happened here. I really don't.
Blood Mountain was a testament to what modern metal could be (I still don't know what to call Mastodon's style, so 'modern metal' is just gonna have to be the big catch-all until I think of an appropriate title), and while each successive Mastodon release got a little bit less heavy (nothing was going to top the sheer weight of Remission, as flawed as the album may be), they were inventive and interesting and, most importantly, fantastic songwriters. They could take all these elements I'd normally abhor and somehow craft very infectious and memorable tunes around them.
I really admired that ability, and no amount of overexposure or radio play is going to make me enjoy Blood Mountain or Leviathan less. But the truth is, when Crack the Skye first came out, it pissed me off so much that I didn't listen to Mastodon at all for nearly four years. From the release date of this fourth album until the day I started this series, I didn't intentionally listen to a single note from this band. Yes, Crack the Skye is really that fucking bad. All the kind of eccentric proggy elements I wasn't fond of but could appreciate how they made them blend with everything else before have taken center stage, and instead of aggressive barnburners and strong, catchy melodies and choruses, we are now inundated with long, spacy prog jams, and endless slow tapping melodies and 100% Mudvayne vocals.
It blows my mind how they could have spent their first three albums constantly refining their sound, perfecting the little details and carving out their own specific niche, just to reach this point and go 'You know what? Fuck all that, we want a more intelligent audience, so let's just drop the heavy influences we have and instead focus on Genesis and Dream Theater and the light Opeth songs'. I'm not crying because they changed (hell, every previous album was distinctly different from its predecessor), I'm crying because the change they made sucks like a turbocharged hoover.
This reminds me a lot of what happened with Norwegian black metal hellions, 1349, with their fourth album (released two months after this here), Revelations of the Black Flame. Almena method pdf. Both bands had started off pretty raw and unrefined and then nailed their particular sound on their third albums, and then for their fourth had apparently just decided that they needed a change and completely abandoned what they were good at. 1349 did not play to their strengths by abandoning the frantically brutal and straightforward black metal and instead focusing on ambient, and Mastodon did not play to their strengths by abandoning the punchy heaviness and strong, hardnosed aggression and melody by instead focusing on longwinded and melodic prog rock. Mastodon taking a huge influence from Pink Floyd and King Crimson seems interesting at first, but when you actually hear it in action it just ends up horrendously depressing.
A band as frantic and energetic as this just doesn't translate well to this laid back style of songwriting. The band never lets loose like they're so good at doing, and even Durgha spends all of his time in the background just giving very simple backing beats as opposed to the nigh endless showboating he's so well known for. So the flair is toned down and it's a lot less showy, that doesn't necessarily mean it's inherently bad, right? Most of the time, sure, but here it's proven pretty early on that when Mastodon wanders outside of their established home base, they just end up lost and confused and have no idea what in the hell they're doing. All seven tracks here just kind of meander about without much cohesion between the individual instruments or the vocals.
And oh yeah, the vocals are at their all time worst at this point. Not only is the Mudvayne voice the only real vocal lead (I still don't know which member sounds like individually, sue me, they're all similar), but it's also more nasally than ever before. It's like he has a dastardly head cold that they couldn't wait to heal because they'd already booked the studio time. The perplexingly popular 'Oblivion' is a perfect showcase for such an issue, as that damn chorus repeats itself seemingly dozens of times, and his voice just grates and grates and grates and oh god make him stop Jesus Christ it's making my liver hurt somehow.
...">Mastodon Crack The Skye Instrumental Blogspot Themes(29.12.2018)I don't know what happened here. I really don't.
Blood Mountain was a testament to what modern metal could be (I still don't know what to call Mastodon's style, so 'modern metal' is just gonna have to be the big catch-all until I think of an appropriate title), and while each successive Mastodon release got a little bit less heavy (nothing was going to top the sheer weight of Remission, as flawed as the album may be), they were inventive and interesting and, most importantly, fantastic songwriters. They could take all these elements I'd normally abhor and somehow craft very infectious and memorable tunes around them.
I really admired that ability, and no amount of overexposure or radio play is going to make me enjoy Blood Mountain or Leviathan less. But the truth is, when Crack the Skye first came out, it pissed me off so much that I didn't listen to Mastodon at all for nearly four years. From the release date of this fourth album until the day I started this series, I didn't intentionally listen to a single note from this band. Yes, Crack the Skye is really that fucking bad. All the kind of eccentric proggy elements I wasn't fond of but could appreciate how they made them blend with everything else before have taken center stage, and instead of aggressive barnburners and strong, catchy melodies and choruses, we are now inundated with long, spacy prog jams, and endless slow tapping melodies and 100% Mudvayne vocals.
It blows my mind how they could have spent their first three albums constantly refining their sound, perfecting the little details and carving out their own specific niche, just to reach this point and go 'You know what? Fuck all that, we want a more intelligent audience, so let's just drop the heavy influences we have and instead focus on Genesis and Dream Theater and the light Opeth songs'. I'm not crying because they changed (hell, every previous album was distinctly different from its predecessor), I'm crying because the change they made sucks like a turbocharged hoover.
This reminds me a lot of what happened with Norwegian black metal hellions, 1349, with their fourth album (released two months after this here), Revelations of the Black Flame. Almena method pdf. Both bands had started off pretty raw and unrefined and then nailed their particular sound on their third albums, and then for their fourth had apparently just decided that they needed a change and completely abandoned what they were good at. 1349 did not play to their strengths by abandoning the frantically brutal and straightforward black metal and instead focusing on ambient, and Mastodon did not play to their strengths by abandoning the punchy heaviness and strong, hardnosed aggression and melody by instead focusing on longwinded and melodic prog rock. Mastodon taking a huge influence from Pink Floyd and King Crimson seems interesting at first, but when you actually hear it in action it just ends up horrendously depressing.
A band as frantic and energetic as this just doesn't translate well to this laid back style of songwriting. The band never lets loose like they're so good at doing, and even Durgha spends all of his time in the background just giving very simple backing beats as opposed to the nigh endless showboating he's so well known for. So the flair is toned down and it's a lot less showy, that doesn't necessarily mean it's inherently bad, right? Most of the time, sure, but here it's proven pretty early on that when Mastodon wanders outside of their established home base, they just end up lost and confused and have no idea what in the hell they're doing. All seven tracks here just kind of meander about without much cohesion between the individual instruments or the vocals.
And oh yeah, the vocals are at their all time worst at this point. Not only is the Mudvayne voice the only real vocal lead (I still don't know which member sounds like individually, sue me, they're all similar), but it's also more nasally than ever before. It's like he has a dastardly head cold that they couldn't wait to heal because they'd already booked the studio time. The perplexingly popular 'Oblivion' is a perfect showcase for such an issue, as that damn chorus repeats itself seemingly dozens of times, and his voice just grates and grates and grates and oh god make him stop Jesus Christ it's making my liver hurt somehow.
...">Mastodon Crack The Skye Instrumental Blogspot Themes(29.12.2018)