CRACK THE SKYE

Second masterpiece in a row and the last one they have put out (at least at the moment). Crack the Skye is the most celebrated Mastodon album and I can see why. Personally, I like it as much as Blood Mountain, but CTS is a lot more melodious, prog-oriented and doesn't have any of the sludge riffs that the band had on their first albums, something that is positive for the prog fans that doesn't like metal that much.

The lyrics on this album are the best from the band by far. This was their third consecutive concept album, and by the time they have already learned how to do it real good. Here you have an interesting story about astral projection with a lot of psychedelic imaginery (like the classic third eye), which is represented on the album cover too. But what is really interesting for me are the references to Brann Dailor's life. As all of you may already know, this album is dedicated to the sister of Brann, who commited suicide at the age of 14, and there are two songs that have direct connection with this topic.

The first of this songs is "Oblivion", which have one of the most painful verses I've ever heard. The part that says "I tried to bore a hole into the ground, breaking all the fingers and the nails from my hands" tears my soul apart everytime. As Brann said on an interview, after the death of Skye he began to experiment with heavy psychedelic drugs such as LSD, and one night he had a really bad trip which ended in him trying to bore a hole into the grave of her little sister. I like mythology and story oriented lyrics, but is this kind of thing what I really aprecciate in music. Art imitates life as some people say, and when you put your life experiences in your music you can connect yourself with the feelings of thousands of people around the world, which I think is something magical. That's why one of my favourite lyricists of all time is Daniel Gindenlow from Pain of Salvation. The other song involving this lyrical themes is "Crack the Skye", which features one of the best interpretations from the career of Scott Kelly (from Neurosis), and is one of the best songs from the band. I could never avoid crying while listening to this song.

Musicallywise this must be the best Mastodon release alongside the previous Blood Mountain. Here it's obvious that Brent Hinds has taken creative control of the band, as his style of playing with a lot of arpeggiated riffs with open strings are the main force that drives the album forward. Apart from "Crack the Skye" the other best songs are the two suites. The part that I like the most about "The Czar" is the intro, which has one of the more memorable vocal lines from the band. And "The Last Baron" is the best Mastodon song for me, this song is pure perfection. You have an incredible intro, heavy riffs, a crazy solo (which reminds me of some of the crazy shit that John Petrucci used to do in the old days), operistic arrangements that are similar to the ones used by Devin Townsend (4:18) and the best vocal performance that Hinds have done to date. But I'm a very riff addicted guy, I usually lost interest in the music if it does not have good guitar riffs. And the reason I love this song that much is because it has two of the best guitar riffs that I've heard on my entire life, the one that plays at 5:30 and the one at 8:19. And as you can see, these two riffs are influeced by stoner a lot (bands like Kyuss), which is one major turning point in the career of the band.

The rest of the songs are very good on its own. "Oblivion" is super trippy and "Divinations" has one heavy as hell riff on the verses. I really like to the chorus of the later, with that crazy twin guitars that don't stop swinging at any moment. "Quintessence" is a very strange song, which I think has to be with the unusual vocal lines, but I like it a lot. The song I like the least is "Ghost of Karelia", but is worth listening for the drum performance alone, that is top notch as always.

I'm convinced that Crack the Skye will be marked in history as one of the best classics of progressive metal music, and people in 20 years will see it as we see today albums such as Images and Words.