BRANN DAILOR Pays Homage To CHRIS CORNELL And Previews 'Emotional' New MASTODON Album

By David E. Gehlke

Drummer Brann Dailor started lending his vocal talents to MASTODON in time for 2009's "Crack The Skye". Considering the edgier, rougher angles of bassist/vocalist Troy Sanders and guitarist/vocalist Brent Hinds, Dailor's far smoother, cleaner approach turned out to be exactly what the hailed progressive metallers needed to tread more melodic and accessible avenues. While Dailor has since been a regular vocal contributor to MASTODON's studio forays, he'd yet to do something as daunting as his recent cover of Chris Cornell's "Dead Wishes" for KING ULTRAMEGA, the SOUNDGARDEN tribute act led by METAL ALLEGIANCE's Mark Menghi. Dailor's emotive, soaring vocal performance on "Dead Wishes" shows that he's more than capable of holding his own when covering one of rock's undisputed best singers. Furthermore, it provided Dailor with the rare opportunity to stretch his vocal wings without contending with the often-complex music of his main band.

Of course, no discussion with Dailor is complete without getting the latest on MASTODON. The band endured a tumultuous 2025 with the departure of co-founding guitarist/vocalist Brent Hinds, followed by his tragic death that August. The remaining members — Dailor, Sanders and guitarist Bill Kelliher — tapped Canadian guitar virtuoso Nick Johnston to replace Hinds and have since wrapped the recording of their highly anticipated ninth studio album. Sadly for MASTODON, it's another LP preceded by tragedy (Dailor's mother also recently passed away),but in speaking with BLABBERMOUTH.NET, the drummer extraordinaire sounded excited about what the future holds.

Blabbermouth: In doing something like "Dead Wishes" for KING ULTRAMEGA, are you able to further separate Brann the singer from Brann the drummer?

Brann: "I just see myself as more of a drummer, but I've always sung my whole life. I was always in the 'select' choir. I could always do it, and I'd open my mouth in the van and sing along to Stevie Wonder and IRON MAIDEN and all of that stuff. I could do a pretty good King Diamond and Ozzy [Osbourne], so I'd be up there and singing and Brent was listening intently and at a certain point, he was like, 'You got to start singing, dude, I'm sorry.' In approaching something like this with Chris Cornell, which is kind of a bluegrass thing, that's way out of my wheelhouse, and he's really going for it, full-on Chris Cornell vocal prowess on full display. So it was really intimidating to consider doing it, much like a 'Stairway To Heaven' [LED ZEPPELIN]. But I looked at it as a pretty cool opportunity to sink my teeth into something I wouldn't normally do. The vocal style was different from MASTODON. I feel like it has to be a little more, I don't know how to describe it, it feels like with MASTODON, I don't want to do all of those trills and all of the flourishes, it's a little straighter to match up with the music. Hearing all of those nuances that Chris was doing in this song and really going for it, it helps knowing that I don't have to play drums to do that."

Blabbermouth: You bring that up, and it's a good point: In MASTODON, you have to left brain / right brain when singing and playing drums. It has to be a challenge.

Brann: "For this, all the music was there and provided, and they did a beautiful job. Kenny Arnoff is a legend behind the kit. I was like, 'I can spread out on this.' It's Chris Cornell; he can sing anything. He's such an unmistakable and incredible voice — everyone knows that. I was flattered just to be asked. I was like, 'You think I can do that?' [Laughs] [Menghi] was like, 'I heard your 'Stairway' cover, and I think you can do it.' [Note: MASTODON covered the LED ZEPPELIN classic at the 2019 funeral for longtime manager Nick Johns.] I'm like, 'Okay, let me give it a shot.' I had to ramp up with my buddy Miles [Landrum], who is the engineer at our studio, West End Sound. I said, 'I got to get in some kind of headspace with this song.' I brought my mom in because she was a big fan of Chris Cornell and SOUNDGARDEN from the beginning. I remember her listening to this song and being like, 'Oh, that's different for Chris.' I hadn't heard a lot of his solo stuff. I'm really familiar with the SOUNDGARDEN and even the AUDIOSLAVE stuff. I was like, 'He's really spread out on this. He's dipping his toes into a lot of different genres.' The lyrics are so cool, and when I got asked to do it, I listened to the song, and I was like, 'Wow. It's cool. It's different from something I would have done.' I would have picked a SOUNDGARDEN song, obviously, and that would not have been easy to sing at all. But I definitely wouldn't have gone down this particular road. I thought of my mom. She passed a few months ago. I was like, 'She would be over the moon about this. She would love it so much. I'm going to dig in and do my absolute best.' If I thought I was really sucking it up and not doing a good job, then I would have said, 'Listen, I tried. It's not for me. I can't do it.' I was listening back to it and thinking I was at least getting close, being honest and doing a good enough job of representing the vibe and soul of the song. I was comfortable with it: 'Okay, I'll do it.'"

Blabbermouth: You did a vocal guest spot with BLEED FROM WITHIN last year. Do you get asked to do these often?

Brann: "I've been doing more as of late. I never get asked to play drums on anything; it's just vocal stuff. [Laughs] It's easier to do a vocal cameo than to do a drum cameo. Most bands have their players in place and a few spots for vocals. It's all good. I like doing it. I'll do it if I like the song, feel like I can add something to it, and feel like I can get in there and do something cool. I've turned some stuff down because it's not for me. I like singing, especially when there's no strings attached like this. You probably don't have to do it live. I won't have to pick out a cool jacket and walk out front. [Laughs]"

Blabbermouth: Would you ever want to be out front as the lead singer?

Brann: "For my synth band, ARCADIA, I'll do that. We put out a video for the song 'Fuzzy Planet'. I'm this kind of debonair clown in the video. I could do it if I could be a character. I don't know if I could just walk out there, just me, pick out a cool jacket to wear from H&M. [Laughs] Phil Collins, he took his shirt off, he put on some white overalls, like the 'everyman' and got out there and was blue collar. To answer your question, I would do it, but I would have to be another person."

Blabbermouth: Switching over to MASTODON, it's been five years since "Hushed And Grim". Have you started thinking about new tunes?

Brann: "Our new album is finished as of last week."

Blabbermouth: Anything you can reveal?

Brann: "There would be some new music very soon. We're very excited about it. It was a hard record to make. It was a very emotional time for us. I lost my mom, we went through all this turmoil with Brent, and then he passed away. It's been tough. It's all in the music, it's all in the songs, and I'm excited to release it and get it out there into the world because we've been sitting on it for a while. A lot of this stuff, at least the skeletons of what this album is, we've been sitting on for two years now. A lot was going on."

Blabbermouth: There's been a lot of tragedy for MASTODON, even going back to when your manager, Nick Johns, passed away, which inspired "Hushed And Grim".

Brann: "I really thought that this record was going to be without any loss. I'm like, 'We can concentrate on mythological creatures again. We don't have to go down these roads of unpacking a grief cycle.' No, we got a two-fer. That's life. As you start getting older, you start losing your loved ones. Tomorrow is not promised. We're trying to make the best of it and try to figure out what happened to us this past year, so that's what the new album is going to reveal."

Blabbermouth: How's it working out with Nick Johnston? He's got some big shoes to fill.

Brann: "He's not trying to be Brent. There's never going to be another Brent, obviously. He broke the mold, as they say. [Laughs] He was the wild, wild dude. I loved him to death. We had a really close musical relationship. On a personal level, we were brothers, and there was turmoil toward the end. We were trying to help him figure out what he wanted to do, but he was a little bit all over the place. I'm sad the way things ended. Nobody wanted that. I always thought the future version would be coming back together and be like, 'Dude, what the fuck? All that shit?' It's really sad that it's not a possibility. I'm still here, and the other guys are still here, and we are still as dedicated as ever to MASTODON, to this musical project that we started 26 years ago.

"With the search for a new guitar player, Nick was always sort of in the back of my mind because I liked his style. He has an interesting style. I was always looking for the yin and the yang with Bill. Bill's the riff guy and plays all the heavy stuff, and I loved the combination of him and Brent. Brent was the chicken-picking and all that. Nick is very much like that. He's proggy and in a whole other world of guitar playing, and combined with Bill, makes for something really interesting. And he's such a sweetheart and a nice, down-to-earth guy. He's a great person and an incredible player. Holy shit, the stuff he pulls off is really amazing, and you wouldn't know it by meeting him because he's such a humble guy. He just wants to do an awesome job, preserve Brent's memory more than ever now, and get closer to the solos in how they are supposed to be played. We know that people pay attention, and I'm that way. When I go see OZZY, I want to hear Randy Rhoads's solos to a T. I'm singing the solo along to it. I think some of Brent's solos are really iconic like that. They deserve to be played as close to the emotion that Brent put in them as possible. Nick is doing that. The new stuff: Nick brings a whole different flair to his solo sections, but I can also hear the homages to Brent. I loved that he was able to do that, fold it in, and bring some of Brent's personality and what he did for us in MASTODON to the band."

Blabbermouth: Did Brent contribute anything to this record?

Brann: "No. It's all new stuff. Toward the end, unfortunately, it was hard to get him to come down to the space. He was interested in doing other stuff, which was fine. It was a confusing time. [Laughs] I was the one going, 'Come on, man. Come down. Let's riff.' He was a free spirit. He wanted to ride his motorcycle around and do this and that. He was wherever the wind took him. Unfortunately, it was not down to the practice space to work on riffs. It was a little bit frustrating. I was okay with it. I was like, 'Hey man, everyone can do whatever they want to do in their life. If you're unhappy and not wanting to be here doing whatever, figure out what does make you happy and do that.'"

Blabbermouth: One of the additional bummers here is that MASTODON was one of the few bands to break the mold. You had a stable lineup for 25 years.

Brann: "It's hard. We really loved each other. There was a deep love for hanging out with these guys, and I think that Brent really loved the camaraderie of it all. He was a complex human being. It was a little difficult to pin him down. It was like, 'Come on, man. Come to practice!' He was like, 'The last thing I want to do in my life is come to practice. I want to go and hang out and have fun.' I said, 'I get that, man, but it would be cool if you came down here.'"

Blabbermouth: What has this done for you, Troy and Bill? Has it brought the three of you even closer?

Brann: "Yeah, I think so. It has brought us closer together. The three of us are always ready and willing, at every turn, to go down there and work. That's how we've always operated. Brent's lucky. He would come in at the last minute, but it worked for us for a long time. He started to…it was like he didn't want to be there at all. I love the guy, as I said, and it wasn't about anybody being mad or anything. I think he was tired of everything. [Laughs] He was a tired dude, staying up all night. The next day, you don't want to go down and play metal riffs. You just want to go down to the basement and do some chicken-picking at two in the morning. Then, two in the morning turns into seven in the morning. It's the rock star life, I guess. I don't know, the other guys and I are older, well, not older, but those guys have kids. We like to jam during the day and eat dinner at seven o'clock. We had a normal schedule going, but Brent was the genuine article. He was the person whom people sort of idolized because they knew they couldn't get away with that. There were four other people with GG Allin who had to pile in that van after that show."

Blabbermouth: You started as a death metal drummer in LETHARGY, where practicing was a necessity. Is that where you developed that work ethic?

Brann: "I've been playing drums since I was a little kid. I was always obsessed with it. I intensely don't want to let anybody down. I really want to perform well for the fans and give them the best experience they deserve. I also am obsessed with being creative, and my favorite thing to be creative with is MASTODON. I just love to see what's around the corner of what we can do next. As frustrating as it can be sometimes, I like to come out the other side; that's cool and badass. It's something MASTODON has provided for me. I can't control everybody else that's in the band. I can't control everyone and force them to come down and share that with me, but Bill's always willing to work, and Troy will come down and do the work. When you get to this point, I remember reading an article where Lars [Ulrich] said METALLICA was writing a new album, and he said, 'You just have to come down and work.' I'm like, 'Yes. That's it.' Some people go, 'Well, I don't have to go down there.' If you want to put a new record out, somebody has to do it. There's work to be done, but I really like doing it. It's fun for me. I don't care. I go through the set all the time by myself in the basement at my house. I like being towards the top of 'Drum Mountain' and not toward the bottom of 'Drum Mountain'. It's painful to be at the bottom of 'Drum Mountain'. It hurts to play 'Crystal Skull' if I haven't played it in a month. I play it and go, 'This sucks.' So I play it every few days to make sure I'm in the realm, at least at base camp."