MASTODON/SPLATTERHOUSE MYSTERY SOLVED! PLUS: A LOOK AT THEIR AWESOME SUPER DELUXE EDITION OF CRACK THE SKYE
Friday, February 13th, 2009 at 11:00am by Axl Rosenberg
Yesterday Vince speculated that there may be new Mastodon music in the trailer for the forthcoming video game Splatterhouse. Then we got an e-mail last night from composer Howard Drossin, who explained all:
“The music featured is not by Mastodon. It’s mine. I’m the composer on the game. I really appreciate that you thought it might be Mastodon. They are a big inspiration and I respect them enormously. I post the trailer on my blog as well if you’re interested.”
Howard also contributed music to the recent Afro Samurai video game, and from what I can tell from our brief e-mail exchange, he’s a very chill, humble dude. Be sure to check out his website. And thanks for setting us straight, Howard!
After the jump, more Mastodonews.
So: Mastodon, like most bands, want you to buy a physical copy of their new album. But we live in a digital world, and that’s easier said than done. So the band – like so many others – is creating a special super duper deluxe edition of the CD. But here’s the thing: while so many of said super duper deluxe editions actually suck donkey balls, the Crack the Skye one actually looks pretty bad ass.
It would seem the band is drawing on Tool’s 10,000 Days for inspiration – not surprising, given that Mastodon are known Tool fans. And that’s fine by us – I think Vince spent more time studying that 10,000 Days art than he ever did any proper school subject.
In addition to the CD and awesome album art, this one-pressing-only set also comes with a behind the scenes DVD, a making-of photo gallery, track by track band commentary, and a Paul Romano lithograph. It costs about forty bucks but I think it’s totally worth it – in fact, I just ordered mine. Check it out here.
-AR
So it wasn’t them in the trailer, and nobody ever claimed it was definitively them. Oh well, we’ll have to wait until it comes out to see what they have contributed.
And, I, too, have purchased my superfantastic version of Crack the Skye. Boo to waiting another month for it.
I still buy more cd’s than I download and I like that bands are putting effort into making the packaging more interesting. But I think a lot of the reason a lot of people stopped buying discs is because of the price, especially when you’d walk into the now defunct Tower and see new discs for $18-$19. So why do I now want to spend $40. Yeah I realize you get more than just the disc but the idea was to not spend so much on a cd. I’m sure that with s/h and tax that it is near $50. Guess I’m not a super fan. I’ll still buy the cd, but just not the ‘deluxe’ version. Even though there was no dvd, 10,000 days was regular price.
Purchased mine yesterday, I heard that only a limited amount of the lithographs would be available to a certain amount of pre-orders, so I jumped on that right away. Plus, the lithograph is going to be signed by each member as well and I thought that was pretty neat-o!
Thanks for the info. Just ordered mine.
I would only buy it for that sweet lithograph. Fuck the CD.
Lithographs are original works of visual art “wholly executed by hand by the artist” and “excludes any mechanical and photomechanical processes.”
What is being offered are reproductions of a pre-existing work of art.
Under California Civil Code 1738-1745, if you sell a reproduction for $100 or more, you are required to disclose it as a reproduction. Failure to do so, may include but not limited to: refund, interest, treble damages and $1,000 fine per occurence.
Respectfully,
Gary Arseneau
artist, creator of original lithographs & scholar
Fernandina Beach, Florida