The estate of the late former Mastodon member Brent Hinds has filed a lawsuit against the Atlanta metal band, claiming the guitarist is still owed money for his share in the group.
Hinds died in a motorcycle crash in August 2025, just five months after
Mastodon announced that the band and their co-founding guitarist had “mutually decided to part ways.”
In the lawsuit filed in Fulton County Court on September 3, Hinds’ estate says that Hinds and the band hadn’t reached an agreement to relinquish his ownership share in Mastodon — including their music and merchandising — at the time of his death; after he died, the estate was given an $80,000 check to buy out the share, which the estate has not yet cashed, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports.
Despite Hinds’ Mastodon exit in March 2025, the band continued to use Hinds’ photo in promotional materials, including — as the lawsuit claims — a face that resembles Hinds on the cover of the band’s just-released new album Marrow Deep, Mastodon’s first album without Hinds; the band started recording the LP shortly after Hinds’ death.
The Marrow Deep cover features three large figures, with the rightmost bat-faced one wearing a cloak shrouding skulls and human faces. One of those faces, the estate says, resembles Hinds, who did not musically contribute to the album.
“Nevertheless, Defendants selected and placed a recognizable image of Brent on the album cover of Marrow Deep and disseminated that cover to advertise, market, distribute, and sell physical albums, digital downloads and streams, merchandise, and related goods or services,” the lawsuit said. (Lawyers for Hinds’ estate and reps for Mastodon did not immediately respond to Rolling Stone‘s request for comment.)
The estate also claimed that, at the time of Hinds parting ways with Mastodon, the band said they wouldn’t disclose the details of the guitarist’s exit. However, after his death and while promoting Marrow Deep, Mastodon members talked openly about Hinds’ departure, citing his issues with substance abuse.
The lawsuit criticizes Brann Dailor, Bill Kelliher, and Troy Sanders — the three remaining founding members of Mastodon, all of whom are named in the lawsuit — for discussing “details about [Hinds’] private life that they learned in confidence — details he chose to keep private while he was alive.”
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