Preview: Mastodon at The Anthem on Sept. 25

Take the high road to The Anthem on Sept. 25 to see sludge metal band Mastodon perform as part of their Poisonous Weapons Tour. Having released their ninth studio album, Marrow Deep, on Aug. 28 after nearly a year of work, the five-man band from Atlanta announced this tour across the United States and Canada on June 2. They are accompanied by Deafhaven, a blackgaze fusion band from San Francisco, and Alcest, a post-black metal act from Bagnols-sur-Cèze, France.

Marrow Deep includes, as a standout track, “In The Ruins,” inspired by the impact of Hurricane Helene on vocalist and bassist Troy Sanders and is paired with a 2D-animated music video offering harrowingly psychedelic dystopian visual storytelling. The album also comes following the passing of longtime vocalist and lead guitarist Brent Hinds, one of the band’s founding members. While working on the album, Hinds’s bandmates released a 35-minute documentary, The Mastodon in the Room (available on YouTube), in which they offer personal retrospectives on Hinds’s impact on the band’s work, past, present, and future.

Mastodon entered the heavy metal scene in 2002 with their debut album, Remission. This was followed in 2004 with the concept album Leviathan, which has appeal to connoisseurs of metal and classic literature alike for its blend of fast-paced instrumentals and lyrical allusions to Herman Melville’s novel Moby-Dick. Marrow Deep holds up to the band’s high precedent for poetic heavy metal that drew me in as a literarian and drummer, and I highly anticipate experiencing this catharsis live at the Anthem.