By Tom Lanham

n the cold , clinical coronavirus age , no gift horse should ever be looked at directly in the mouth , reckons Mastodon drummer / lyricist Brann Dailor . So , take the Grammy-winning prog-metal outfit ’ s latest odds-and-sods anthology Medium Rarities at face value — as a surprise mid-pandemic present to diehard fans , featuring the jarring new juggernaut Fallen Torches , alongside a collection of hard-to-find B-sides , live cuts , instrumentals , and soundtrack entries like “ White Walker ,” coinciding with three of its members guest-starring on the HBO fantasy series Game of Thrones . There even a few unexpected covers , of Metallica ’ s “ Orion ,” “ Spoonful ” by The Flaming Lips , and Feist ’ s chugging “ A Commotion .” But beneath its shiny , steel-blue exterior lurks plenty of shadowy darkness , a la the group ’ s last studio set in 2017 , Emperor of Sand , mired in the quiet cancer battles fought by bassist Troy Sanders ’ wife and the mother of rhythm guitarist Bill Kelliher , fights won and lost , respectively . Because , no matter how sunny the Mastodon sky seems to be of late , the more storm clouds like COVID-19 assemble to obscure it , sighs Dailor , 45 , from lockdown with his two trusty pets in his native Atlanta . “ We ’ re always going for the happy themes , trying to cheer people up ,” he jokes . “ And it was the day after playing the Palladium , backing the cancer album that we put out , and our longtime manager Nick John said , ‘ I don ’ t feel right ,’ and it wasn ’ t even a year later that he was gone from pancreatic cancer . And were all like , ‘ What the fuck just happened ?’” Visiting their friend in hospice care , they watched him rapidly wither away and felt angry , frustrated , powerless to help — emotions that are currently fueling the grim Emperor follow-up they ’ re recording . But within that penumbra was a silver lining of selfrealization

, he adds : “ Maybe Mastodon has become one of those bands where people are like , ‘ I ’ m feeling really depressed , so the best thing for me to do is revel in it for a minute , put on this album , and live in it right now . And it ’ s gonna help me cry my eyes out .’ Because I do that with certain records , and I ’ m suddenly okay with feeling depressed .” Nice work if you can get it , he concludes , accepting the gift horse for the boon that it actually is . Then , there ’ s this series of clown paintings he ’ s been doing during the lockdown , sending them as gifts to Metallica ’ s Lars Ulrich , The Deftones , Chino Moreno , and Gojira ’ s Joe and Mario Duplantier .

photo by Jimmy Hubbard

IE : Tell me of the clown paintings . How and when did they start ? BRANN DAILOR : They started the very first day of the lockdown when it came into effect in Atlanta . I think it was March 21st , maybe ? It was a couple of days after my birthday . And I was like , “ Okay , I guess I ’ ve gotta stay home , we can ’ t go into the studio ,” and it was just me here , with the dog and the cat . And I had always drawn a lot when I was a kid — I would draw constantly . And my parents thought I was gonna be some kind of visual artist when I got older , but as time went on , I concentrated more on my drumming and hanging out with my friends and stuff , and I didn ’ t do as much art . So by the time I hit 17 or so , I just really wasn ’ t drawing at all , ever . And I moved out of the house , and I started playing drums more and working my shit job at a mini-mart gas station on the C shift there . I worked the graveyard shift , and I dunno how cool that was — I had three guns put to my head , and stuff like that didn ’ t happen during the day . So anyway , for the last 25 years , I didn ’ t really draw anything . But I really meant to — I ’ d say to myself , “ I ’ m gonna draw something

!” And I ’ d be on tour , and I ’ d get a sketchbook , and I ’ d stumble across an artsupply store , and I ’ d go inside and get pens , markers , and swear I was gonna start drawing again . But I never would . And then I ’ d bring all that stuff home , and it would sit in the closet , and I ’ d occasionally look at it and tell myself , “ One of these days , I ’ m gonna crack open that sketchbook .” And that day happened to be March 21st .

And I thought , “ So what am I gonna draw ? I ’ ll draw a clown .’ And I drew this clown head , just the face of a clown , and it came out cool-looking , I thought . And I thought , “ I like that ! Maybe I ’ ll do one tomorrow .” So I did one the next day , and that one came out cool . So I thought , “ Maybe I ’ ll do more , and I ’ ll have this little 14-day clown period , with COVID clowns . Because in the beginning , they said , “ We ’ re gonna shut everything down for two weeks , and that ’ ll be it ,” you know ? And then everything will be back to normal , so I was like , “ Let ’ s go ! Go , team ! Let ’ s crush this thing , and it ’ ll be all good .” So 101 days later , I stopped drawing the clowns . So I did that for 101 days straight and ended up with 101 clowns . My last clown was a clown of my dog , a dalmatian named Thriller — I also own a one-eyed cat named Don Pickles — and he was No . 101 , and I put a clown hat on his head . And I think if it weren ’ t for it being the perfect 101 Dalmatians clown , I probably would still be drawing them right now . But I had to be done with the clowns . And it really helped me through the whole thing , personally . It gave me an anchor . It gave me something to do , something creative that was mine and mine alone . And I was sending them out to people , so sending the clowns out every day became a part of it . With more and more people on the list , receiving the clowns every day , many people

said that they looked forward to it , just to see what I was gonna come up with next . And I usually had the Joker film on TV — I had that playing , and I watched that several times during the pandemic . I really liked it ; I really liked his performance , especially the last ten minutes , which kind of blew me away . I ’ m not a big comicbook-movie person , but I liked that interpretation of it . It ’ s kind of interesting how the Joker has become this Shakespearean character that ’ s a benchmark for actors now , like , “ Are you gonna play the Joker ?” And I ’ d be like , “ Uhh , no ! I don ’ t even wanna try and go there !” But I drew lots of different clowns , and I kept getting new ideas for them . I ’ d get up every morning at 8:00 a . m ., come downstairs , have coffee , water , an orange or a piece of fruit , crack the sketchbook , and start . And some of ‘ em took two hours . Some of ‘ em took seven or eight hours .

IE : What medium did you work in ? BD : Mostly marker , it ended up . Professional markers . Some of them were colored pencil , an outline with Micron pens — it took a few different things to get ‘ em to where I wanted ‘ em to be . And it was cool — it was a learning experience , and I was teaching myself how to draw , because I didn ’ t care what anyone thought of them . And I thought a lot about the last 20 years of being in a band that a lot of people are very critical of , where you put yourself out there , and you ’ re wondering what they ’ re gonna think . It ’ s a thing that ’ s a part of it that shouldn ’ t be , but it is . But I ’ m not worried , critically , enough to change the way I approach something — I never find myself mentally thinking that we need to change a song to appease anyone but ourselves . It doesn ’ t ever go there . But I do worry , once it ’ s out there , that

continues on page 26