Let’s get this straight: Crack the Skye is confusing. I needed some help interpreting this one. First of all, let’s look at the basic concept behind the music. Mastodon has 4 albums that have used Elemental themes: Remission was fire, Leviathan water, Blood Mountain earth, and this masterpiece, Crack the Skye, is Ether, an ancient element that was believed to be the medium through which light travels, which makes sense if you look at the story of the album. The story begins with a paraplegic. He cannot move his arms or legs and can only travel using astral travel, travelling along the astral plane. inOblivion, the boy paraplegic, who is astral travelling using a golden umbilical cord attached to his solar plexus, gets said cord burnt off as he “flew beyond the sun before it was time, breaking all the fingers and the nails from my hand”. He believes himself to be dead, but he is told by spirits in the spirit realm that he is not dead. In the song Divinations, he is summoned into the body of Rasputin, an ancient Russian historical figure who was believed to have special “super” powers. As Rasputin tries to assassinate the Czar in The Czar, he himself is murdered, and the two souls (Rasputin and the boy) fly out into a Crack in the Sky (Crack the Skye) By this time, the boy’s parents believe him to be dead, so Rasputin tries to help the boy find his way back before they lose all hope and before it is too late to do so. Then, the two encounter the Devil, who tries to steal their souls and bring them to hell in The Last Baron. The story is never resolved, and it is the reader’s interpretation of what happens next.
Whew. What a story.
Amid all the spirtual meaning of the album is the simple concept of Ether. This Ether allows the boy to astral travel. Among other things, there is a special meaning to the extra ‘e’ in Crack the SkyE. Skye was the sister of drummer Brann Dailor, and he has dedicated the album to her, a fine thing to do, especially for such a masterfully done album.
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