bill kelliher

Mojotone and Mastodon guitarist Bill Kelliher introduce Kelliher's Artist Signature pickup, the "Hellbender."

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Mastodon’s Bill Kelliher (guitar), Troy Sanders (bass/vocals), Brann Dailor (drums/vocals), and Brent Hinds (lead guitar).

Photo by Clay Patrick McBride

With a gripping new album and a new direction in their music, the band continues to raise the stakes for what it means to be one of America’s most feverishly creative—and unreservedly beloved—heavy-rock guitar duos.

It’s a chilly night in late November, and the line for ticket holders has snaked all the way around the block. “Wow, that’s what I call dedication!” yells a passerby, marveling at the size of the crowd. Strict COVID protocols are causing delays at the doors to New York City’s sold-out Hammerstein Ballroom, but no one here seems to mind. After all, it’s been more than two years since the four prog-metal horsemen of Mastodon last descended on Gotham. What’s another half-hour in the cold, especially when the payoff is a sweat-soaked live set packed with brand new songs and some of the band’s most feral old-school headbangers?

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