Back on a Remission

"So far it feels great being able to mail my rent home from the road," says Mastodon bassist/vocalist Troy Sanders by phone on a warm, sunny California Sunday, traffic audibly whipping by across the line. "The little money we make at the bars goes right into our gas tank and our bellies. The merchandise is where we make the money that lets us come home and have our bedrooms waiting for us, and I've still got one so far."

Along with Mastodon guitarist/vocalist Brent Hinds, guitarist Bill Kelliher and drummer Brann Dailor, Sanders is touring the West Coast for the first time, and if the band's merchandise sales -- not to mention national and international press -- are any indicator, it's going to be a successful run.

The Atlanta-based band -- which made its name independently on the East Coast and in the Midwest -- are on a 45-day tour with thundering San Francisco heshers High On Fire, a tour that will circle the U.S., going through the Southern states, up the East Coast, back along the U.S./Canadian border before dipping into Canada and returning home. But this tour also represents another type of cycle, because the four members of Mastodon originally met at a High On Fire show in Atlanta in January 2000.

Kelliher and Dailor, both formerly of northeastern bands Today Is The Day and Lethargy, had relocated to Atlanta barely a month before they met Sanders and Hinds, who played together in Four Hour Fogger and other bands. Then, after one practice, before even one song was written, the four had a band and a name that described the vibe they knew would result: slow, heavy, but when roused, capable of tremendous force. "Not a lot of people or animals could fuck with a mastodon," Sanders says. And not many people can fuck with Mastodon's prowess.

Mastodon's music isn't a blind charge, though. It's more like a march. No less seismic, but far more focused. For Mastodon's new Relapse Records CD, Remission -- the band's first full-length, after a Relapse EP and a Reptilian Records picture-disc single -- Mastodon took 10 days to meticulously record 11 tracks. They're part prog-metal, part black-metal, part hardcore -- the songs don't fall easily into a distinct category. Their parts -- crystalline but heavy, and anchored by dexterous drumming -- trample all over the metal map.

For all of Mastodon's growling gallop, though, Remission isn't simply a stampede of grinding anger. The record's peaks-and-valleys dynamics reflect the road Mastodon has taken of late. Many of the songs work as maps to the band's emotions -- the stress of touring and the appreciation of getting to see some success -- as well as maps to what they've literally seen from the windows of a tour van.

"I listen to our album and I'm not angry when it's over," Sanders says. "I'm relieved. I've been taken on an emotional roller coaster touring with this band and that translated recording this album, and I've always enjoyed getting that same feeling from listening to the albums of bands I love."

Most of Mastodon's songs have that feeling of traveling, whether it's the act of physical motion or just scanning back through the years of great metal bands. Drawing on influences from Black Sabbath and Pentagram to Iron Maiden, Cliff Burton-era Metallica and Venom, Mastodon recall a time when metal had movements, it didn't just lunge and lumber.

On the other hand, Sanders claims the top CDs getting play in the tour van these days are by George Jones, Thin Lizzy, Genesis and Weezer, with the occasional Bach CD thrown in. Raw emotion is the unifying element, whether it's slow and heavy, fast and light or even quirky and awkward. At the same time, technical finesse is not overlooked. The band's triumphant tempo and structural shifts, the evolution of the songs, put Mastodon in the company of bands like Coalesce and Neurosis.

"What we're doing is refreshing to people because it's different but recalls parts of all the things they like," Sanders says. "Just the other night in San Francisco this guy -- totally sober -- cornered me to tell me what he'd seen had changed | him. And I totally believed him, because when I saw Neurosis 10 years ago, it totally changed my life. And, ironically, Neurosis was in the crowd at that show. Not only affecting someone, but seeing a band I grew up on watching me has had me high for days. Half my dreams are realized."

Considering the response the band has been getting, some of Mastodon's other dreams -- like releasing one album a year and touring internationally -- don't seem far fetched. The four members seem more than willing to put aside their day jobs -- construction, screen printing, cooking and stocking -- to crowd in a cramped van, because the pay-off of playing together is worth much more than food or gas, or perhaps even rent.

"Eight hours in our van, driving through the mountains, is certainly cramped," Sanders says, "but it's more spiritual than any day's work back home. We're going to ride this ship until it sinks. But the foundation is really strong, so I think it's going to sail for a while."

Mastodon plays a CD release show Fri., June 21, at The Earl, 488 Flat Shoals Road. High On Fire and Suckpig also perform. 9 p.m. $7. 800-594-TIXX. www.badearl.com.