{"id":581078,"date":"2026-08-26T17:08:12","date_gmt":"2026-08-26T17:08:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/581078\/"},"modified":"2026-08-26T17:08:12","modified_gmt":"2026-08-26T17:08:12","slug":"mastodon-marrow-deep-album-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/581078\/","title":{"rendered":"Mastodon, ‘Marrow Deep’: Album Review"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tListening to just a few minutes of Marrow Deep, Mastodon<\/a>\u2018s tempestuous ninth album, it becomes clear quickly that they just don\u2019t know how to feel anymore. The album is arriving roughly a year after the death of founding guitarist-vocalist<\/a> Brent Hinds, whom they fired acrimoniously a few months earlier<\/a>, as well as the death of drummer-vocalist Brann Dailor\u2019s mother in February 2025. Writing an album under these circumstances wasn\u2019t new to Mastodon.<\/p>\n

\n\tAll but a few of the group\u2019s albums have found Atlanta-based headbangers in throes of grief: They mourned the 2018 death of manager Nick John on their most recent album, Hushed and Grim (2021), guitarist Bill Kelliher\u2019s mom on Once More \u2018Round the Sun (2014), Hinds\u2019 brother who died in a hunting accident on The Hunter (2011), and the death by suicide of Dailor\u2019s sister, when he was a teen, on both Crack the Skye (2009) and Remission (2002). Hinds died in a motorcycle accident about a week before the group entered the studio to record Marrow Deep.<\/p>\n

\n\tSo when vocalist-guitarist Troy Sanders growls, \u201cWe don\u2019t get over this,\u201d on the album\u2019s\u201dIn the Ruins,\u201d true pain resounds in his voice. In some ways, Marrow Deep is Mastodon\u2019s \u201cShine On You Crazy Diamond,\u201d a tribute to a bandmate who was crucial to their beginning but lost his way, as they recently explained eloquently in a video<\/a>, as well as an acknowledgement of life\u2019s frailty. When Dailor sings, \u201cI saw your ghost again, followed by crushing feelings of regret,\u201d to Hinds on \u201cGhost Again,\u201d he sounds raw, and after a brief musical reprieve, the song congeals into the crunching, gnashing, chomping riffs that close it out. It\u2019s heavy. It\u2019s also weirdly emotional, at least for a metal album.<\/p>\n

\n\tMarrow Deep bears all the sonic hallmarks of Mastodon\u2019s discography \u2014 raspy, bellowed vocals, riffage that ranges from chunky to viscous to nubbly, off-kilter rhythms that make headbanging dangerous, and solos galore \u2014 but there\u2019s something about the way they bring off the songs in which you can hear their turmoil. This isn\u2019t a terrible thing. They\u2019re playing at the peak of their abilities, and keyboardist Jo\u00e3o Nogueira and lead guitarist Nick Johnston, who each joined the group this year, keep the original trio on their toes. But their instruments often weep, howl, and ululate as much as the vocals.<\/p>\n

\t\tEditor\u2019s picks<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cBarbarian\u2019s Blood\u201d opens the album with a riff that feels like drowning, as it heaves back and forth like crashing waves and Sanders cries for help, \u201cWe\u2019re in danger, losing everything.\u201d \u201cGolden Spires,\u201d one of the album\u2019s highlights, trembles with gut-shaking rhythm guitar like the backdrop of a play tumbling down to reveal a bare stage. \u201cFree yourself to live, all I know,\u201d Sanders screams. \u201cFree yourself to live.\u201d Meanwhile, in \u201cThey\u2019re Coming for You,\u201d the music feels as though the world is crushing in as guitar riffs crawl like spiders before parachuting onto you, on \u201cOut Lik a Lamb,\u201d Nogueira\u2019s organ swirls into a death spiral.<\/p>\n

\n\tAlthough the vernacular of prog rock has been an important part of Mastodon\u2019s sound for the past 20 years, the group\u2019s adventurous soloing comes even more to the fore on Marrow Deep. Nogueira takes as many leads as Kelliher and Johnston, and echoes of synth- and keyboard-driven bands like Pink Floyd, Deep Purple, and even Yes are far more prominent on the album than previously. Nogueira can summon creepy, John Carpenterish analog synth (\u201cBarbarian\u2019s Blood,\u201d the ballad \u201cMoth and Bone\u201d) and Dream Theater-like wheedling (\u201cSnakes for Dinner\u201d), sometimes adding to the songs (bell-like sounds in \u201cIn the Ruins\u201d) and sometimes letting it get away from himself (closing song \u201cThe Three Fates,\u201d which is basically a prog jam.)<\/p>\n

\n\tThe guitarists work through their feelings with bluesy motifs, pyrotechnic eruptions, and, going with the \u201cShine On\u201d allusion, long, breathy, David Gilmourish phrasing. But they don\u2019t do it all alone. As usual, Mastodon\u2019s guest list runs deep on the album. With Converge\u2019s Kurt Ballou co-producing it with the band and Patrik Berger (Lana Del Rey, Charli XCX), it\u2019s no surprise Converge\u2019s Ben Koller and Nate Newton make appearances, playing percussion and growling along, respectively. The album also features cameos by heavies from Gojira, Lamb of God, Queens of the Stone Age, and Clutch.<\/p>\n

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\n\tBut it\u2019s the intro to \u201cThe Vanishing,\u201d played by Black Sabbath\u2019s Geezer Butler that speaks to the overall vibe of the album, as he riffs about and jams on ideas like he\u2019s warming up until his recitative transforms into a baleful motif. It becomes one of the album\u2019s best songs, with an easy groove, as Dailor apes Ozzy\u2019s vocal effect from Sabbath\u2019s \u201cPlanet Caravan\u201d and sings, \u201cWatch the universe expand romantically\/I see my mother join beloved sister.\u201d Then Sanders sings words that seem to capture all of the crippling remorse he and his bandmates feel: \u201cThe more we love we suffer in it\/Stays with us \u2019til the end.\u201d He asks, \u201cCan we bear the wound that never mends?\u201d The song ends with him screaming \u2026 just screaming.<\/p>\n

\n\tMarrow Deep at times feels turbulent, ornate, measured, chaotic, and cathartic. Most of all, it sounds mature. Gone is the callow rage and aspirations of badassery that prompted them to write Leviathan about Moby-Dick. They may try to cloak some songs with references to Greek tragedies, but the fates and furies here are Mastodon\u2019s own, uncontrollable and unique. All you can do is listen and wonder, \u201cHow much can one band take?\u201d as you howl along with them.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Listening to just a few minutes of Marrow Deep, Mastodon\u2018s tempestuous ninth album, it becomes clear quickly that…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":581079,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[156,27670,157,111,139,69],"class_list":["post-581078","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-music","tag-entertainment","tag-mastodon","tag-music","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/581078","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=581078"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/581078\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/581079"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=581078"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=581078"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=581078"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}