10 Bands Who Weren’t Afraid To Change Their Sound

Mastodon burst into the metal scene with their debut album Remission in 2002, and their early material was highly unique and experimentally heavy, with vocals largely either shouted or screamed over impressively quirky musicianship. Their second album, Leviathon (2004), was a concept album based on Herman Melville’s classic novel Moby Dick, and retained the heaviness which saw them become cult heroes in the underground scene.

But in 2006, they showed the start of a move into a new direction with album number three, Blood Mountain, which was their first for their new major label Warner Bros. Featuring a significant increase in the use of cleaner vocals, Mastodon also started to inject a progressive feel to their music. This change was developed further with Crack The Skye (2009), another concept album which this time told the tale of a quadriplegic who discovers the powers of Astral Projection.

Clearly no generic run of the mill band, Mastodon then changed their style further with The Hunter in 2011, and an emphasis on writing shorter catchier songs. They have since continued to focus on a more traditional brand of song writing, which culminated in the highly acclaimed Hushed & Grim (2021), a full on rock album which sits far from the sound of their early material.