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Brent Hinds - 1974-2025
On August 20, the Atlanta community lost one of its beloved members in the one and only Brent Hinds. Hinds was well-known as co-founder and guitarist of the Atlanta-bred metal band Mastodon as well as numerous other acts in the local music scene. He was a true “outlaw,” a rebellious rock star that walked the walk and talked the talk. It seems like just about every local musician has a story about Brent. Despite being a New Jersey native, Brent even played a huge role in my own musical journey.
As a young and impressionable guitarist, I spent much of my teenage years watching MTV2. In the early ‘00s, MTV was fueled by reality TV like The Real World and Road Rules, but MTV2 was a throwback to its earlier days of mostly music related programming. They’d air all kinds of concerts and music video countdowns, all of which shaped my musical tastes in ways that still linger to this day. I’ll never forget tuning in late one Saturday night, almost certainly after getting up to no good with some friends, to find that MTV2 was airing Headbanger’s Ball. This was a resurgence of the classic show from the late ‘80s and early ‘90s but with a focus on the new wave of metal music that was spreading amidst the underground and forging a dedicated fanbase. I was amongst the uninitiated, my metal knowledge at the time beginning and ending with Ozzy Osbourne and Metallica, yet I was glued to the screen. I found most of it highly entertaining, there was no shortage of technical wizardry on display and the guttural “Cookie Monster” vocals had me laughing like an episode of Comedy Central Presents… (another favorite of mine in that era). My young brain couldn’t quite process the bedlam and cacophony it was ingesting but that switch of curiosity was flipped and it wouldn’t turn back off.
I tuned in again weeks later, recognising some of the acts from the previous edition. Some were bands that I’d grow to love, Avenged Sevenfold and Between The Buried and Me among them. But there was one band that stuck out far more than the others. Their music video was a bit surreal, following a party of clowns and carnival oddities jamming along to the raucous revelry. The first time that I watched it, I was distracted by the dazzling and unusual sights. This second time, however, the music and bevy of riffs were what really sparked my interest. The song was “Blood and Thunder.” The band was Mastodon.
Over the years, I kept up with them and their growing discography. I’ll always remember my high school friend Colin Dunn celebrating the release of their third record, “It’s called Blood Mountain. It’s about a mountain made of blood!” I finally saw them live for the first time in 2011 at The Trocadero in Philadelphia where they played a tremendous set filled with many of my favorite tunes.I’d go on to see them numerous times, including once where I briefly met Brent outside the venue after the show. He carried his trademark mischievous grin and was in tremendous spirits after a job well done.
Mastodon were (and still are) a wholly unique band in the metal world. Their sound is as heavy as the prehistoric mammal that provides their namesake, their progressive tendencies keep the listener on their toes, and each musician’s individual style contributes to the sound of the whole. Brent’s guitar playing was particularly enigmatic, a firebreathing mix of a rocker’s reckless abandon combined with the banjo roll-style right hand acrobatics of a bluegrasser. He’d quipped something along the lines that he was “just a country guitar player in a heavy metal band” but that was such a huge part of why he stuck out and rose above the sea of shredders. This extended to his compositions, most notably the record that is often hailed as Mastodon’s creative pinnacle, Crack the Skye. Much of the record consists of Brent’s ideas after recovering from an incident that left him in a coma and it’s hard to miss his fingerprints all over the album. As a guitarist myself, I found his playing to be almost alien, coming from the same planet where one-eyed Sasquatches (or Cysquatches, for those in the know), Moby Dick, and the ghost of Rasputin are all real. Coincidentally enough, since moving to Atlanta and spending far more time on acoustic fingerstyle, I’ve noticed more and more elements similar to Brent’s playing creeping into my own.
It’s been heartwarming to see the Atlanta music community and the greater metal community come together to celebrate Brent’s legacy and mourn together. Brent was a larger than life personality who left a lasting impression on everyone he knew and everyone who heard his music. If you’re not familiar with his work and not much of a metalhead, I’d recommend the Mastodon songs “The Beast” and “The Hunter” as two fine examples of Brent’s mellower side. If you like to crank the volume up to 11, their album Leviathan is full of energy, aggression, and ALLLLLL of the riffs. And perhaps most importantly, always take extra care on the road to keep an eye and ear out for our neighbors riding motorcycles. R.I.P. Brent Hinds (1974-2025)
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