Immersed in Fanboy Heaven

n my less pretentious teenage years I was a big fan of all things metal. I gradually, however, found myself gravitating away from the more pedestrian areas of the genre, such as Slayer, who employed a classic thrash sound that influenced many. It became clear to me that the genre had moved way beyond that point in the intervening 20 years. Before long I found a vast array of new sounds, from the insane jazz inspired stylings of Behold...The Arctopus to the more minimal drone metal approach of Sunn O))). To put it bluntly, my taste became the subgenre I later came to discover was quite derisively known as Hipster metal, a term I would ditch in favour of ‘cerebral metal’ or ‘intellectual metal,’ or something equally aggrandising. A sizeable chunk of this music was post metal such as Isis or Pelican, in other words an ecletic genre with tinges of post rock, metal, hardcore, ambient and more. As a hipster metal fan, or metal hipster, I often enjoy looking back at the review of the great albums of my teens and discovering that they were actually quite highly rated on sites like Pitchfork. Isis’ Oceanic is a good example of an album that managed to shake off music fans’ studs and leather metal stereotype to receive some pretty widespread acclaim across the board. Sadly though, one thing me and Pitchfork didn’t see eye to eye on was my favourite album of all, Pelican’s City Of Echoes. I sought out their review not long ago, expecting to see suitably gushing praise for an album that managed to seamlessly move through blistering and melodic, a true odyssey of instrumental music, where the guitar interplay of then guitarist Laurent Schroeder-Lebec and Trevor de Brauw was so full and incredibly evocative that vocals would only have corrupted the sound. Instead, what I found was a rather scathing review that opened with the line ‘Fire the drummer.’ Allegedly drummer Larry Herweg totally ruined the album. So I dutifuly relistened in an attempt to reconcile my love of the album with this cynically cutting attack. Strangely enough, though, my feelings were no different. Tracks like ‘Far From Fields’ were still as anthemic and mindshatteringly euphoric as ever, and while I would argue that the album is really all about the aforementioned guitar interplay, the rhythm section more than held its own. All of this extensive personal context may seem superfluous but perfectly explains why it’s interesting to me that the very first tone heard on their new Southern Lord released album, Forever Becoming, comes from the drums. Album opener ‘Terminal’ is all about the drums, in fact, with a slowly developing beat smashes in violently along with a blast of feedback based dissonance that develops into the guitar. For my money, the track is right up there as one of their most anthemic and strikingly beautiful tracks in their back catalogue. In fact, instead of simply carrying the album along in the background, a job done perfectly well in the past, the rhythm section seems to have a much bigger role, more often taking centre stage. Perhaps this is explained by all that’s changed with the band, who’ve returned from a four year silence interrupted by last year’s EP Ataraxia/Taraxis, an EP that although posessing remnants of the classic Pelican sound, seemed a little more acousticly motivated and somehow less organic, although it was still pretty great if I’m honest. Ataraxia/Taraxis proved to be that last output involving founding guitarist Schroeder-Lebec. So between the large time lapse and the addition of The Swan King guitarist Dallas Thomas as a replacement for Schroeder-Lebec, I think I wasn’t the only one a bit apprehensive about what might be produced. With ‘Terminal,’ however, all my concerns immediately evaporated and I was lost once again in the ethereal world of Pelican’s music. Going further into the album I started to encounter elements of their previous work, and really it’s the same old Pelican, it would be unfair to suggest that they haven’t moved on and incorporated new ideas but it still consists of the style of riffing and guitar leads that I’ve come to admire so much. Much like City of Echoes and 2009’s What We All Come To Need, the band continues to use shorter tracks, in the four to eight minute range rather than the 10 minutes plus region that largely prevailed on their earlier albums such as their first truly classic album, The Fire In Our Throats Will Beckon The Thaw. Tracks like ‘The Tundra’ even evoke memories of their debut effort, Australasia. Where they’ve changed, though, is that the grandiose guitar melodies have lessened in their dominance, with a much more sparing use augmented with their crunchy riffing as usual and the aforementioned increased role of the rhythm section, or the Herwigs. Bassist Bryan Herweg, whose tone is spot on by the way is the force that drives tracks like ‘Vestiges,’ and it’s hard to argue that this doesn’t add a new depth to the album, with their guitar flourishes all the more amazing and emotive when they do happen. A great example of how they’ve moved on is ‘Threnody,’ a track that starts off like it found its way out of a Steve Roach album but gives way to a particularly gigantic riff that I’m sure will be the inspiration of many moshpits to come. Almost 900 words in, it’s pretty clear that I’ve avoided naming highlights, and that’s because it’s a dangerous game when it comes to Pelican. Their musical complexity means that at least ten listens are needed to finally eradicate moments that may have eluded me during my previous listens. True to form, though one track that particularly moved me was the closer ‘Perpetual Dawn,’ perhaps a companion piece to earlier track ‘Immutable Dusk’ and arguably its mirror image. ‘Immutable Dusk’ starts off pretty vicious and slowly and melodically decays to a rumbling bassline in a hugely Pelican-esque moment as the drums and guitar join in and build up in a really emotionally resonant way (see: pretty much every track on City Of Echoes) to a sludgy behemoth, possibly the best riff of the album. ‘Perpetual Dawn’ does the opposite starting off ambient before kicking into a less restrained form. At ten minutes, it’s the albums longest track, and they use the space created by this to really gradually move along, with the heart wrenching journey from ambient to a stoner-rock like riff to ambient rumblings complemented by acoustic guitars to a hugely anthemic riff that’s brought to life by a punchy drum line, giving a real sense of catharsis until it slowly dies down, replaced once again by acoustic guitars as I nearly keel over with the deep wave of melancholy it creates. Despite its relative length, I can safely say I felt pretty much every second and for me that’s really what Pelican’s music is about. Pelican are perfect at the art of balancing amazing technical ability with the creativity to turn that all into a cohesively structured song.They also seem to manage to balance a keen sense of experimentalism, within their genre at least and a mash of great riff into something truly emotive, and by the end of any Pelican release I’m always left with a familiar spine-tingling satisfaction along with a sense of melancholy that it’s over already, and Forever Becoming is no different in that respect. I guess the summation of everything I’ve said is that after a turbulent and controversial few years Pelican are back, blasting eardrums like the best of them, presenting an album of evolution rather than all out revolution. Pelican will always be Pelican and there’s absolutely nothing I can fault with that fact. I’m gonna close my review with the simple sentiment – please keep the drummer. Forever Becoming was released on October 14th through Southern Lord.