About.com Rating

The Bottom Line

Following on the heels of their EP Ephermal, Pelican returns a few months later with their latest full-length of instrumental psych-sludge, What We All Come to Need.



Pros

• Pelican has finely honed themselves as one of the most precise bands of their ilk.
• "Ephemeral" sports one of the best grooves Pelican has ever recorded.
• Allen Epley's vocals work like a charm on "Final Breath" and may be a future option to consider.

Cons

• Pelican are in danger of repetition.
• "Ephemeral" th album's best song was hijacked from Pelican's previously-issued EP.

Description

• Released October 27, 2009 on Southern Lord Records.
• Featuring Greg Anderson and Aaron Turner with guitar cameos.
• Featuring vocals by Allen Epley on “Final Breath.”

Guide Review - Pelican - 'What We All Come To Need'

Pelican only dropped their smoky Ephemeral EP a few months back and immediately deliver a new full-length What We All Come to Need, featuring a few notable guests and a comfortably hazy drone throughout.

“Glimmer” continues the trance-psych work Pelican’s been dabbling with as of City of Echoes. Pelican next muddies up their sound with Sunn O))) and Goatsnake strummer Greg Anderson on “The Creeper,” turning their songwriting measures back to The Fire In Our Throats Will Beckon the Thaw. “The Creeper” assumes a titular stride on Pelican’s slinking riffs before they splash on atmospherics and amplitude.

Unfortunately, What We All Come to Need’s strongest cut is the title track from their Ephemeral EP.

“Ephemeral” serves this album quite nicely, albeit the remainder of the album doesn’t quite elevate to its class. Granted, it’s a focused and largely dialed-in album, particularly when getting to the hefty, faster section of “Specks of Light,” which boasts snazzy ethereal plantings by Isis’ Aaron Turner.

One dimension of Pelican most fans express missing is their capacity for resounding sculpting mechanisms. Pelican, like Isis and Neurosis, could masterfully build to shattering climaxes, a motif which no longer seems to hold as much interest in their songwriting. Pelican now opts to slide right into the meat and juice, hook you on a chug and dabble mystically within their compositions’ innards. “Specks of Light” is a prime example of Pelican gaining their listeners’ attention then falling into a lollygagging sonic space-out.

From a dramatic standpoint, expect very few moments on What We All Comes to Need, albeit “Strung Up From the Sky” does benefit from suddenly jacked cadence after sequential bars of steady melody.

Pelican does seem intent on giving tender to their past while trying to hedge their identity into a more fashionable form of static expressionism. You will hear subliminal drops of familiar notes and chords from their landmark earlier work on What We All Come to Need as it keeps a reserved tempo. Accordingly, “An Inch Above Sand” is the closest Pelican comes to replicating the configuration of Austrailasia by hammering down a set of titanic audile waves after toying with their listeners for a few minutes.

Daringly bringing in some vocals for the first time on “Final Breath” courtesy of Allen Epley (Shiner, The Life & Times), Pelican really hits the nail sweetly here. Conceived around Robert Burns’ poem “A Red Red Rose,” the sluggish pace and a Cure-esque Goth ambience Pelican weaves for Epley to swoon overtop is mesmerizing. Epley’s vocals introduce a new aspect to Pelican’s capabilities and they should be brave enough to consider using them again.

Less exploratory than they’ve been in the past, Pelican at this point in their career is merely riding the crests they’ve opened for themselves. Treading perilously close towards repetition, this band will need to open new ravines before they get written off as a one-trick pony.