The Daily Swarm

Royal Flush Film Festival:

On July 8, 2007, Atlanta’s prog metal giants “Mastodon ended more than thirteen months of nonstop touring in support of their 2006 critically acclaimed album, Blood Mountain, with a show opening for Metallica at London’s Wembley Stadium. Mastodon were excited to finish the tour in such grand style, but the boys were also ready to head back home for a much-needed break before they began writing what would become Crack the Skye, their fifth full-length album and second for Warner Brothers/Reprise Records. But, as fate would have it, this wasn’t to be the case.

Instead, in September of that year the Foo Fighters invited Mastodon to come down to Las Vegas and perform at MTVs Video Music Awards. Never ones to miss a show (or a party for that matter), the Mastos accepted, and delivered a characteristically enthusiastic performance. However, the evening took a near-tragic turn when guitarist Brent Hinds got into an intoxicated post-show altercation with another attendee of the VMAs, later reportedly identified as singer-songwriter William Hudson. This altercation would leave Hinds in a coma for almost a week with a life-threatening brain hemorrhage. In the aftermath of this incident, Hinds was afflicted with severe vertigo and brain trauma that left the songwriter bedridden for a month.

But while he convalesced, Hinds took advantage of the situation. He spent his days playing with his dogs, Geisha and Melvin, carving large tiki statues, and most importantly, playing a shit-ton of guitar. It was during these weeks of recuperation that Hinds wrote the bulk of the songs that would eventually make their way onto Crack the Skye. Not only did the event serve as an unexpectedly inspiring one for Hinds, but it seemed to encourage the rest of his bandmates vocalist/bassist Troy Sanders, guitarist Bill Kelliher and drummer Brann Dailor to dig deep for their own contributions (lyricist Dailor was finally able to address the death of his sister, Skye, who is the inspiration behind the albums title).

So the following year, on May 26, when Mastodon entered Southern Tracks studio to begin recording with producer Brendon OBrian, the band had more than enough songs written. Mastodon began recording on June 19, and Director Jimmy Hubbardalso the photo editor at Guitar World, Revolver magazines was invited by the band to travel to Atlanta to film and document the recording of Crack The Skye. Hubbard then cut this footage into a Documentary that was released with the Crack The Skye album. However, the Royal Flush Festival will be the first time the documentary has been screened for the public. Director Jimmy Hubbard in attendance for Q & A.