“Can you learn 17 Mastodon songs immediately? Please give some love, stage right, say hello to Mr Ben Eller”: YouTuber makes Mastodon live debut following Brent Hinds’ shock exit – but what’s next for the prog-metal behemoths?

Mastodon has had quite a week, parting ways with their co-founder and maverick guitarist/vocalist Brent Hinds after 25 years. Drummer Brann Dailor appears in public sporting a black eye. YouTuber Ben Eller is drafted in as Hinds’ replacement and performs an epic 17-song set. And the band promises that their 2025 tour cycle will continue unabated.

Lesser bands might have been calling this an extinction level event but the big beasts of progressive metal have not skipped a beat, with Eller making his live debut with the Atlanta, Georgia quartet last night (9 March) at Tool In The Sand, in the Dominican Republic.

The question is whether he is going to be a long-term replacement for Hinds, or is he a temporary stand-in?

Oh, but there are so many more questions, too. How did Dailor get that shiner? Why after all these years was now the right time? And how long was this personnel change in the offing that they were able to announce Hinds’ departure and draft in Eller at such short notice?

Addressing the crowd at the Hard Rock Hotel and Casino in Punta Cana, Mastodon bassist and vocalist Troy Sanders suggested Eller had little to no preparation time.

“Can you learn 17 Mastodon songs immediately?” Sanders said, deadpan, introducing Eller. “Please give some love – stage right – say hello to Mr Ben Eller.”

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The chances are that there would have been plenty of guitarists in the crowd who would already have known who Eller is. He has played guest leads for Tennessee deathcore champs Whitechapel. More than 506,000 people subscribe to his YouTube channel, where he runs instructional content alongside deep dives into various artists’ styles – among them, yes, Mastodon.

What were the chances that Mastodon were among the some 925,000 people who had viewed Eller’s 2019 “Stuff Mastodon Does” video of 2019 and had him in mind should anything happen to its twin-guitar access of Hinds and Bill Kelliher. More recently, Eller shot a video unpacking the brilliance of their seminal 2004 studio album Leviathan.

As for Hinds’ departure, Mastodon’s statement struck an amicable tone, explaining that after 25 years – and no small measure of success in taking the band out of the underground and into the mainstream – the decision was mutual.

“We’re deeply proud of and beyond grateful for the music and history we’ve shared and we wish him nothing but success and happiness in his future endeavours,” it read. “We are still very inspired and excited to show up for fans in this next chapter of Mastodon.”

One thing is for sure. Hinds will be missed. He is a one-off. Brilliant, irascible, unpredictable, all kinds of wild – but above all talented. Who else would have the chutzpah to play some chicken pickin’ fills in a brutal progressive-metal concept record about Moby-Dick and the genius to make it one of the electric guitar highlights of the album?

His work with Kelliher yielded some truly audacious metal guitar arrangements. With Hinds this animalistic force of nature, and Kelliher more studied, reserved, they were one of the great guitar partnerships in metal.

No question, Eller has the chops to perform this material. The Tool In The Sand set was a trial by fire. But can he bring his own flavour to Mastodon’s material like Hinds did?

Time will tell. Expect some news sooner rather than later. There are lots of dates in the diary. Mastodon hit the road with Coheed and Cambria and Periphery in May. See Mastodon for dates and ticket details.