I'm pretty sure it is real instruments yeah. Maybe not though.

I was looking around at some videos and they sure play with a pile of strings and percussion, so maybe it is proper, and my ears is just busted.

It would make sense otherwise though, with the big mismatch between the recorded band and the rest of the music if they were cheating the orchestra sounds via programmed professionally recorded symphony samples.

It could also be that they just had someone record it who was mostly/only comfortable recording the proper orchestral shit, but didn't know what the fuck to do with high gain amps and growly vocals.

Some of the tracks don't sound so muddled in the guitars/growls/drums area. It's easy to hear if you have the real recording. I was being literal in that I think they recorded the metal aspects at a home studio and brought in mp3s of them, and used low bitrate. For I think it was tracks 6 and 7 they open up as if for those ones they invested the extra megabytes in lossless or just better quality. I mean this was in 2004 so they might have been like "aw my thumb drive doesn't have enough room, I'll just use some lossy fucking bitrate since I took out a mortgage on hiring an orchestra..."

The new Mastodon album took me a few listens but I'm really enjoying it now. Probably their best since Crack The Skye which I'm not sure they'll ever top.

I dig it so far. I appreciate the 3- and 4-part vocal harmonies in a heavy band, too.

Less noodly-prog-jammy than their usual thing. More song-y. But the drumming seems to be back to the really apeshit ridiculousness. (All the auxilliary percussion is a nice touch.) Some really, really damn fine guitar tones happening here too.

Yeah it looks like they've got a good release on their hands.

Apeshit is the correct configuration for Mastodon's drums.

Turned on to this by Snaxie's post in another thread...

I like. The Gathering's influence is very real here.

And various other old Meshuggahs

I hate to be that guy, especially in the context of metal, but their first EP is actually really, really good. The first two full-lengths ain't shabby either if girl-fronted gothy doom is your thing. Reminds me a lot of Paradise Lost at times. Not too big on 'em after that, but did see them a couple times circa Comalies and met the band. They were very friendly, including Cristina. Chatted about guitars with the guitarists- I can't say I've run into a guitarist mingling with the crowd after a show who wasn't up for talking guitar stuff over a drink, ever. (Though I regret not asking the one dude from Future of the Left about their tunings- I wondered what was up with that, but we were talking Marshalls and Oranges. The dudes from Carcass were super cool, too. But I digress.)

It's kinda funny given the production gloss (Waldemar Sorychta produced it; if you don't listen to Grip Inc., you should. 'S his band with Dave Lombardo. It is awesome.) that it's quite obvious those are Marshall Valvestates there. Best damn recordings of the things you'll ever hear. Okay, Death's Sound of Perseverance ain't bad, either. Nice drum sound on that. Sounds like all natural drums if memory serves, too.

The tone on it, especially at the end of the last track, is actually the exact same as on The Gathering's Mandylion.

A quick Google search tells me same producer, same studio (I think he owns the place). So I'm not so surprised.

Aha! I had a feeling that was going to happen. He was pretty much the guy for European metal in the nineties wasn't he? Therion worked with him too.

At least for the stuff that Fredrik Nordstrom didn't produce. Waldemar's a badass guitar player in his own right, and Grip Inc.'s Solidify is one of the best sounding metal records I've ever heard, still, eighteen years after its release. (Spoiler: you can actually hear Lombardo fuck up and come in late on one of the songs. It still rules. All analog tape, too. Big, big fuckin' tone.) He definitely produced a bunch of cool stuff. Always dug Tiamat and Moonspell. Seen the latter; very good live band. (Don't know the former has ever played in The States.)

Love the whole Gibson and Marshall thing going on with this album. The lead tones remind me of Rush's first album. Brann Dailor is a hell of a drummer, too.

Yeah the toanz on that album are awesome and the drumming is one of my favourite things about Mastodon. I don't like all the gratuitous solos on the new album though - Brent is an awesome player but I preferred it when they were the odd moment of awesome rather than in every track on the album.

I have to confess, I kinda like the gratuitous soloing as it's a bit more of a classic metal vibe, which I enjoy...

Speaking of classic metal and gratuitous soloing (skip ahead 1:10; it's the usual sort of synths/choir/war drums intro track; I attempted to set a different start point for the video, but the forum did not like that):

Lots of this lately.

New freakin' Decapitated.

It's... Oddly melodic and tonal for a Decapitated song.