Its been a while since I did a legitimate album review, its not because there hasn't been albums there to review but because I've had diarrhea for over a week. Most of that time the last thing I could care about was listening to then writing about an album that a week later could disagree with everything I wrote. Anyway for the review, The Hunter is the fifth album by probably my favourite metal band to listen to right now Mastodon. This is the first album after my favourite release by them Crack The Skye but what I really love about them is how strong the discography is, the band evolves per album allowing for people to prefer the album with the sound they like the most.
The album starts with one strong riff coming from the track Black Tongue and immediately I get excited by what is to come from not only this song but also the whole album. Unsurprisingly the drumming is as powerful as usual, the songs very melodic and if anything its business as usual for these guys. Curl Of The Burl seems to be a track some are scratching there head about, its certainly an accessible sounding track and if anything a more hard rock than metal track, but its still distinctly Mastodon. A throwback to Mastodon in the Remission days is what we get on the track Blasteroid with some classic Brent Hinds Screams to what is a much more frantic song to most on this album.
One of the parts I really love about Mastodon is how beautiful songs sound, Crack The Skye had so many moments that build up to such incredible chorus moments of euphoria. The track Stargasm is my favourite on this album, starts up slowly the riffs are smooth as fuck while the chorus by Brent as he goes into the smooth vocals and hits "You're on fire". The album is still strongly prog, the riffs are exploring throughout the album tracks like Octopus Has No Friends shows this off, the drumming at parts is borderline ridiculous, something Brann Dailor does, it really does come off sounding great.
When I listen to this album its kind of like the smallest of pieces from the albums before this have all been incorporated and its formed with new ideas an incredible album. So many tracks that are so melodic and smoothly done, the riffs so precise and scarily some of these tracks are just catchy. One of those tracks is Dry Bone Valley its got a bit of hard rock appeal to the track particularly "I wish that I was still there/I want to keep on breathing".
The final few tracks feature something that really doesn't relate that well to the softer melodic nature of the rest of the album. Spectrelight is a total balls to the wall metal track, power, speed, screams, aggression on the track the riffs are chunky and less progressive but still sound great. This is easily the most raw sounding track on an album that has such clean production and songs that might be seen as far more accessible. Another track that moved away from the album was that of the album closer The Sparrow which was the most BAS song on this thing. The Acoustic guitar use which off the top of my head hasn't been done in this band makes this a curious track to end on.
The album is great, I love it, there's moments that I kind of feel its borderline samey, but overall its so fuckin great, the riffs are magic, the drumming frantic and fierce. The vocals a mixture at times of rough as fuck and beautifully clean. To end Metal Album Of The Year
Overall Rating: 9/10
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