Mastodon bassist Troy Sanders talks about 20th anniversary of 'Leviathan' ahead of Pittsburgh show

Doing a tour tied to the anniversary of any old album would not really appeal to Troy Sanders, the bassist/singer for the heavy metal band Mastodon.

But the band’s upcoming tour, marking 20 years since “Leviathan,” their seminal concept album based loosely around “Moby-Dick,” was released is a different story.

“We’re happy to do this one because it just feels more like a celebration instead of like, ‘Hey, we don’t have any new music, let’s just go play an old record for people.’ I don’t think that would really work if we just picked something that wasn’t so pivotal in our band’s trajectory; it was such a powerful album,” Sanders said Friday. “Looking back at our discography, that album sold more than any of our records that we’ve put out. So there’s something special about it for sure. And so I’m really on board with celebrating this record. But I don’t think it would fly if we just pulled out any old record that not many people would give a damn about hearing.”

Mastodon will be co-headlining the Ashes of Leviathan tour alongside Lamb of God, who will be celebrating the 20th anniversary of their “Ashes of the Wake” album. The tour hits Stage AE in Pittsburgh on July 30, with former Slayer guitarist Kerry King’s solo band as well as Malevolence.

Sanders said the tour with Lamb of God is a natural fit, as members of each band have been friends dating back to 1998, when half of Mastodon was in a band called Today is the Day and Lamb of God was going by the name Burn the Priest.

“We’ve played many, many stages and shared stages of festivals and done tours with them many times since,” Sanders said. “So we’ve all become very good friends. We have a lot of respect and appreciation for the band, what it stands for and the guys in the band. So yeah, much love, excited to go on with them for sure.”

In a call after a practice at their Ember City rehearsal facility in Atlanta, Sanders delved more into “Leviathan,” whose idea it was for a “Moby-Dick” concept album, the band’s longevity, new music and more:

This tour celebrates the 20th anniversary of Leviathan. What do you think it is about that album that still resonates with people?

We had two records prior to that, but ‘Leviathan’ was the one, the record that made the biggest splash and truly put our band on the map in the world of heavy, chaotic music at that time. When I’m listening, now that we’re playing the record and listening back to all of it, it showcased what our chemistry of musicianship, like how it came to be. When our band formed, we had an appreciation for classic rock, thrash, heavy metal, rock, a lot of different inspirations collectively amongst the four of us. I think it took that third record ‘Leviathan’ to showcase (our sound) — overall it’s a very heavy record but there’s a lot of moments where it touches on cool rock ‘n’ roll solos and rock riffs and then a melancholy track at the very end with ‘Joseph Merrick.’ It just kind of touches on a lot of musical styles under the heavy metal umbrella, the songcraft itself. A lot of it was beautifully abrasive and just a lot of moments and riffs that were just on fire and, combined with our band taking a risk at doing a conceptual album based on the story of ‘Moby-Dick,’ which could have been a win, it could have been a hit or a big giant miss.

Along with very stunning artwork, I feel everything came in, it was fate aligned and with this beautiful artwork, this very unique collection of songs with a storyline mimicking (Herman) Melville’s ‘Moby-Dick,’ so when that record came out in 2004 it truly — whether you liked it, loved it, hated it or married it — made a statement and thankfully all for the right reasons. It maintained this longevity where, to this day, people are like, ‘I got into you guys in ‘Leviathan’ if it’s people our age. And then a lot of times we meet their kids like, ‘This is my 12-year-old, this is my 17-year-old daughter’ whatever at our shows, so it’s gained a life of longevity that obviously we never expected or planned for by any means. I think everything fell together wonderfully and fate aligned, and we created a classic in the world, in our slice of this genre. We’re very proud of it still, but I’m glad it maintained a life of its own.

For the inspiration of ‘Leviathan,’ did somebody come in and say ‘Hey, we should do an album about ‘Moby-Dick”?

We were starting a European tour and the three of us in the band went to London where we started, and our drummer Brann was on a vacation from Hawaii and he wound up taking, to get the cheapest flight or whatever, he took four legs of flights to get there — it was like Hawaii-Seattle-Atlanta-London, whatever it was. So four flights and he landed exhausted and he’s like ‘Dude, I read the whole story of ‘Moby-Dick’ on those flights.’ We always had driven around the United States in white vans. We went through three vans just trying to get our band out there, we’d play anywhere that people would have us, VFW halls, dive bars, boatsheds, anywhere. So we’re always in a white van, and we always called the van ‘The White Whale,’ I guess, not really referencing ‘Moby-Dick’ in particular.

But anyway, so our drummer read the whole book on four flights, landed, and he’s like, ‘Dude, they’re crazy like us. They’re out in the boat looking for something that might not be there. We’re in a van that we call ‘The White Whale’ looking for the success that might not be there.’ And when they refer to the whale as the “salt-sea mastodon,” he was like, we’ve got to do that. It’s got all this water imagery, and they referenced the whale as the mastodon. And we drive ‘The White Whale’ and we are Mastodon. So all these dots kind of connected. And we like concept records, King Diamond, Iron Maiden, things of Genesis in the ‘70s and ‘80s and whatnot. We’re like, all right, this could be career suicide or it could be making a bold statement. And so we all were on board and we felt like if we’re all enthusiastic about trying this, it’s worth going for. Lyrically, it created a bunch of imagery about water and sea nymphs and folklore and monsters. So we all thought it was a great idea. We went in, put it together, and thankfully, everything fell together wonderfully. And we’re still talking about it now.

Did your record label have anything to say about that? Second thoughts or anything?

I don’t think so, because we had the first couple of records that Mastodon did, we put out on Relapse Records and they were always very supportive and loving of us. They just let us do our own thing and turn in a record when it’s ready. So I remember they all loved the idea once it was all put together because I think the music kind of spoke for itself. It wasn’t just average, cookie-cutter music with a cool story. It was like the music was interesting from top to bottom. It touched on many styles. And there’s all sorts of rock, there’s all sorts of riffage and sounds and patterns and drums and so the label was super on board with it.

As you’re practicing this whole album right now, has doing that taken you back to 2004 like a memory hole or anything like that?

It jogged up some memories. We rehearsed what became that record on tour in 2003, maybe early 2004, and we were on a tour supporting Clutch in 2003, I believe, and we just started practicing what would become the ‘Leviathan’ record on stage for the Clutch crowd every single night. So that’s when we really honed in and cut our teeth on what became the ‘Leviathan’ record, and this was in a day and age where we were a nobody band really, and it wasn’t like people came to hear Mastodon hits. (laughs) And there was no cell phones up everywhere, so we could play a whole new record with the stuff and not have to worry about a really terrible version being all over the internet or something.

So we would play the ‘Leviathan’ record every night, and that tour ended in Seattle, which is where we recorded at Litho Studios with Matt Bayles. When we concluded the tour in Seattle, we were kind of honed in and ready to rock, and we knocked it out, we were kind of jogging a lot of memories about how that happened, because it obviously wouldn’t happen these days. We’re not going to go write a record live every single night and work on that in this day and age. Absolutely not. So that was kind of a unique moment in time. Half of these songs we played over the years a lot, and the other half of the songs we haven’t played since 20 years ago or ever live. So yeah, it’s cool to work up a whole record.

So this tour is going to be a little bit of a family affair. Your brother Kyle is playing with Kerry King, and your other brother Darren is the bass tech for you. How does that go out on the road with all three of you out there?

It’s great, man. It’s a lot of work out there, and bands aren’t always raging and partying their (butts) off every night. It’s not all like that, but it’s cool to have those moments of hanging out, and especially like on days off, that’s something where we could go catch a baseball game at the stadium … or just do something that’s not a normal thing to do in life and go hit the Tiki Lounge downtown Pittsburgh. I go there every time I’m in town. So for the moments like that, days off especially are cool but to tour around, I’m stoked that my brothers will be out there with me and that we’ll all be together. That’s pretty special for me personally.

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Looking ahead is there more music on the way? Is that something that’s going to happen after the tour?

Our latest album, “Hushed and Grim,” I think came out in October of 2021. It’s going to be three plus years before our next record comes out. We’re very excited to really hone in on all the riffs and musical ideas that we’ve been collecting for the past three years. So I would imagine that when this Ashes of Leviathan tour concludes, we’ll probably be very excited to really jump in and work on a whole batch of new material for what will be coming, the next Mastodon record. So I’m excited about it and safe to say all four of us are.

What do you credit for the band’s longevity, because not a lot of bands are as stable for as long as you have been together?

It’s a combination of hard work, good fortune and good luck. But humans, relationships aren’t, they stray. Best friends, boyfriends, girlfriends, husbands, wives, it’s never a guarantee. So thankfully, since our band formed in 2000, so it’s been 24 years, all four of us have maintained the end goal, which is to constantly write music that we thankfully still appreciate and respect with one another, and we want to make a living by playing music. We’re still interested and able to tour. Some bands can just grow old, tired of that or they just can’t with their personal lives, situations and whatnot. So thankfully we’re still on board, we’re still connected with what we’re doing and why we’re doing it.

I chalk it up to to we still have our ambition intact but knowing that a lot of people mean well but their lives take separate, they grow apart. Thankfully we’ve maintained the relationship that we’re still growing together. Sharing the same dedication and passions and thankfully have not grown apart. That’s not a great answer, but that’s what it truly is. You know, we’re married, we’ve been married together for 24 years and so thankfully we’ve got more pros than cons going on with our band life and each other. It’s a wonderful thing. We don’t take it for granted by any means.