So you’ve listened to Mastodon’s albums, you’ve watched their videos and maybe you even own a ‘Crack the Skye’ T-shirt. But what can you expect if you’ve never actually seem them in their natural element, onstage under the lights, amps cranked and rocking out?

“I can definitely guarantee that they can expect four prehistoric, ugly, hairy cavemen onstage with their instruments trying to hit circles with wood and bang on a four-stringed instrument — that’s what we do,” bassist-vocalist Troy Sanders recently told Loudwire about the band’s current North American fall tour behind their latest album, ‘The Hunter.’

“We’re wail [or whale?] rock,” he continued, paused and then added, “but really we’re just prehistoric cavemen trying to play in a band together. It’s that simple.”

That’s all fine and good, but what can we expect these four hairy caveman known as Mastodon to actually perform? “We play a proper headlining set of roughly 90 minutes, and it’s a mixed bag of tunes spanning the past five records of our existence,” continues Troy, finally getting serious. “We hope to please newcomers as well as out hardcore fans simultaneously.”

The Mastodon fall tour with Dillinger Escape Plan and Red Fang kicked off Oct. 25 in Austin and runs through a Dec. 2 gig in their hometown of Austin, Texas. Sanders explained that Mastodon typically try to play a club gig “somewhere like in Birmingham, Ala., or Baton Rogue [La.], or something along those lines to work the kinks with the new songs and new crew” before launching a major trek in a city like New York or Austin, but this time around it didn’t happen. “Boom!” he exclaimed. “We’re jumping right in it!”

For an exclusive, behind-the-scenes peek at life on the road with Mastodon, check Instagram pictures  taken by the guys in the band posted on their official website here. And be sure to check back with Loudwire for our full interview with Mastodon’s Troy Sanders.

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