Mastodon's Brent Hinds' VMAs Head Injury Due to Fight With System of a Down Bassist

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The head injury Mastodon guitarist Brent Hinds suffered MTV's Video Music Awards weekend appears to have been caused by an altercation between Hinds, System of a Down bassist Shavo Odadjian and musician William Hudson. Initial reports indicated Hinds was jumped, but hotel-security footage and eyewitness reports now reveal that the singer was drunk when he encountered Odadjian and Hudson outside the Mandalay Bay Hotel and Casino (coincidentally, the site of this year's Rock 'n' Roll Fantasy Camp). According to a police report the Las Vegas Weekly cites, Hinds was the instigator and allegedly took off his shirt and hit Odadjian with it, then punched Hudson in the face and chest. After initially trying to calm Hinds, Odadjian and Hudson punched him in the head, resulting in Hinds' severe injuries: brain hemorrhaging, a broken nose and pair of black eyes. No charges have been filed yet, but the Vegas police report lists Hudson as a "suspect" who faces possible charges of battery with substantial bodily harm, and refers to Odadjian as a "witness."

A representative for Hinds, who was apparently released from University Medical Center of Southern Nevada last Friday, issued this statement to Pitchfork: "Brent has begun writing and wants to just put all this past him for the moment." Mastodon was in Vegas for a VMAs performance with Foo Fighters and a crew of their pals including Josh Homme and SOAD's Serj Tankian.

The show's other major fight (Kid Rock Vs. Tommy Lee) led to police action, but no injuries.

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Song Stories

“The Everchanging Spectrum of a Lie”

The Joy Formidable | 2011

The opener off the Welsh group’s The Big Roar album was an epic one, but the band was worried that track had polarized fans. “The first song is eight minutes long,” Rhydian Dafydd, the Joy Formidable bassist, said. “If you did that in the Seventies people would be, ‘Whatever.’ You do it now, people think, ‘Holy s---!’ Some people think it’s the f---ing greatest track on the entire album, and some people think it’s f---ing boring. It’s that element of needing to challenge people.” The band concluded through the song’s lyrics that love was the “everchanging spectrum of a lie.”

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