Mastodon (The Electric Factory, Philadelphia, PA, May 5, 2016)

[ATTENDED: May 5, 2016] Mastodon

I first heard Mastodon with their Moby Dick-inspired concept album Leviathan.  Since then, their albums have gotten bigger and better, with many more elements (they now have four singers in the band, and a great mix of really catchy stuff along with really heavy, kinda scary stuff).  Their latest album, 2013’s Once More Round the Sun has been a favorite of mine for the past three years.

I was supposed to see them at the Starland Ballroom in Sayreville in November of 2014.  I even had my ticket purchased.  But through a terrible goof on my part, I couldn’t go.  I’ve been wanting to see them ever since.  They opened for Judas Priest in 2015, but I wanted to see them as a headliner.

They are planning a European Tour this summer, but for some reason, they decided to play one gig in the States, and they chose Philly.  I was pretty psyched to get my ticket!  I was even more psyched to learn that they played more or less the same set as they did at Starland Ballroom.  Honestly, I don’t really like when a band doesn’t mix up their setlists all that much. But in this case, it was fantastic.  I didn’t look at the songs before the shows, but I did check to see that most of the songs were from Once More, which was perfect. After The Dillinger Escape Plan, I assumed that Mastodon would be even louder.  And while they were loud, it was a different kind of loud.  Not as harsh and piercing as TDEP, just big and rumbling like a bulldozer.  I have to assume that the sound guy was raising the sound levels throughout the show because by the final song before the encore, I felt like the drums didn’t sound as good anymore–they were pushing levels into the red.  And I had to use earplugs for the last few songs.  This hindered the show a tiny bit–but I think it was so loud by then that it was maybe hard to hear any of the details they were playing.

The band came out and I had managed to get to within a dozen or so people from the stage.  These guys came up behind me–all wearing suits and ties (!)–talking about the show and the mosh pit and what not.  I realized I was pretty close to the pit, but when the band kicked off with “Tread Lightly” the opening rack from Once More, I was too excited to care about the moshing.  And it wasn’t all that bad.  Until about half way through the song when about fifty guys came rumbling over from the bar–how they fit into the space I don’t know–and then the moshing began.  I was about three people from the edge of the pit for much of the show, with people getting pushed into me (but I was in no real danger–unlike the guy in the three-piece suit who went into the pit and came put with broken glasses).

I had never really seen what the band looked like, so I had no idea that the lead singer and bassist Troy Sander has such wild hair (none of my photos do justice, but he had what looked like a lion’s mane of hair and beard–pale and wispy and very long.  He sings in a deep guttural voice, so it was very funny to see him making amusing faces at people in the crowd–smiling at some, pointing at others.  And when he finally spoke, his talking voice was quite normal.

The thing that really impressed me in this show was the drumming of Brann Dailor. His drums get a little overshadowed on record since there’s so much else going on, but live he was amazing.  He played a super fast double bass and despite the relatively small size of his kit, it sounded like he had about twenty drums up there.  Many was the time I was just blown away by a fill he put in.

For “Blasteroid,” a song that has a surprisingly poppy-sounding chorus (including an “oh oh….oh oh” part), Sanders guided us like a conductor going up and down the notes.  His bass playing was really great–playing along with many of the riffs, but also laying back when needed.  I particularly liked how he, the nominal frontman, would walk to the back of the stage when the two guitarists took over.

When the opening notes of “Oblivion” rang out the crowd went wild and when it was followed by the insanely catchy chorus of “The Motherload” (“this time, things will work out just fine“) the whole place was singing along (and moshing at the same time).

Mastodon has four singers, and since I had never really watched them before I wasn’t sure who did what.  So it’s drummer Brann Dailor who sings the clean vocals (like on “The Motherload”).  Sanders who sings the growly vocals (less growly as the years pass, but still rough) and what would be called lead vocals on most songs.  Lead guitarist Brent Hinds sings the other voice–sometimes higher pitched, but often just as growly–especially live.  Hinds also had a big mess of hair and a beard.  He played a series of different guitars, including what I think was a clear lucite flying V.  He was on the other side of the stage for most of the show, but he would occasionally come over to our side to duet with rhythm guitarist Bill Kelliher.

Kelliher plays rhythm as well as a lot of the complicated riffs that make up the song.  He doesn’t really sing, although he does chime in once in a while providing the really deep voice “death growls” on a couple of tracks.  I don’t think Kelliher switched his guitars at all during the show.  As far as his hair goes–his head was shaved all the way around with short hair on top.  he also had a wonderfully crazy mustache.

“Chimes at Midnight” continued the Around the Sun songs (they played 7 of 11 of the songs from that album), which was then followed by their catchiest song, “High Road” compete great voices from all of the singers.

Then the band went back to Leviathan for two songs “Aqua Dementia” and “Iron Tusk.”  Their earlier music is much heavier and much more mosh-pit friendly so the dancing was at a fever pitch during these songs–with people coming seemingly from out of the woodwork to shove their way in.  I saw lots of people’s feet go up in the air as people were pushed along by the crowd.

Their first album, Remission is the only one I don’t have, so I didn’t know “Mother Puncher,” but if their songs from Leviathan were heavy, this one was the heaviest of all–hearkening back to the days before they started adding more prog elements.  I was really happy this show didn’t prove to be some kind of throwback to this album, where they might play the whole thing in order or something.

They came out of that song with Once More’s “Halloween” and then followed it with one of my favorite instrumentals “Bladecatcher.”  Hinds briefly spoke before the song saying we’d better keep our hands in the air for this one.  It didn’t sound quite as good as on record (some of the interesting sounds were lost), but the guitars were spot on.  By this time, the music was just getting louder and louder, and I was getting pretty exhausted.  Even though they only played for 90 minutes it was a non-stop 90 minutes.

They jumped back and forth between albums before ending the main set with Leviathan’s “Megalodon” and Blood Mountain‘s “Crystal Skull.”  and taking a little breather.  Blood Mountain is another great album.  I could have listened to a bunch of songs from that album too.

In the few shows I looked at before hand, their encore has been one song, but I was so excited when they began their encore with the 11 minute, four-part epic “The Czar.”  It was great to hear it live, as the album it’s on, Crack the Skye, is just as good as Once More.  I would have loved more songs from Skye, but the show would have been about 4 hours long if they were going to play everything I wanted to hear.

While that would have been satisfying enough, I was even more excited that the followed this up with “Blood and Thunder” the lead off track from Leviathan.   It’s a loud, heavy bruiser of a song that got the hole crowd worked up into a frenzy.  I came out of that show sweaty and exhausted (but delighted that it over before 11PM).

When the two guitarist and bassist left the stage, the drummer came up to the front of the stage.  It’s the first time I had seen him all night since he was hidden behind a cymbal most of the time from my angle.  He told us that this was their 25th show in Philly and they loved the city.  And then he started talking about beer, because apparently Mastodon sells some of their own micro brews (!).  And then he asked who wants some wood and proceeded to throw about a half-dozen drum sticks into the audience–none came close to me sadly.

The band didn’t have a lot going on in terms of stage show, which was fine.  But their backdrop was very cool.  It is the album cover, but if you look at the pictures above, you’ll see that the backdrop changed design depending on which lights were on it.  Each color light brought out different items in the painting.  Which is pretty cool.

• Tread Lightly
• Once More ‘Round the Sun
• Blasteroid
• Oblivion
• The Motherload
• Chimes at Midnight
• High Road
• Aqua Dementia
• Iron Tusk
• Mother Puncher
• Halloween
• Bladecatcher
• Black Tongue
• Ember City
• Megalodon
• Crystal Skull
• Encore:
• The Czar
• Blood and Thunder