Brent Hinds

On August 20, we lost one of modern heavy music's most accomplished guitarists. We salute the master of Mastodon

-  JOEL MCIVER

I MET BRENT HINDS a few years ago at a Mastodon gig. For some reason, he was standing next to me at the public bar, waiting in line to buy a drink, rather than staying out of sight backstage, so I introduced myself as a writer for Guitar World's sister magazine, Total Guitar, and bought him a beer and a shot.

We talked briefly before he headed backstage, but I couldn't quite figure him out. My impression was that he was a bit of an introvert, perhaps not that good with new people — someone who saved his flamboyance for the stage.

In his personality, Hinds — who died August 20 in a traffic collision in Atlanta at age 51 — was rather like the music of Mastodon. Their eight studio albums are epic, progressive and thought-through, but none of the music is easy to digest or understand, making the elevated commercial position they hold damn near miraculous. Mastodon never recorded a substandard album, either. From day one, they were a force of nature.

A large chunk of Mastodon's brilliance and success can be attributed directly to Hinds. Sure, his partnership with guitarist Bill Kelliher - also a phenomenal musician, who focused more on heaviness and riffs while Hinds tended more toward solos and weird textures - was among the most accomplished in metal. But Hinds' own songwriting and performing was unique to itself; he blended genres deliberately but effortlessly, denying that he was anything as limited as “a metal guitarist” in GW and elsewhere.