Prog is a nebulous term that only gets fuzzier as time goes on, but Mastodon embodies the best qualities of the genre while stamping its own unique features on it. The group’s fourth full-length, the long-awaited Crack The Skye, came three years after Blood Mountain, and peeled back some of the layers of sludge and gloom that shrouded its predecessor. In its place is a starker, more sculpted sound that reconfigures metal into complex and conceptual shapes.
Updated 10/15/2009