Pelican "s/t" CD
[Hydra Head]
It may be an EP, and there may only be four tracks, but this thing still runs barely under 30 minutes of curious instrumental rock that absolutely brings to mind a sludgier Godflesh sans vocals circa the period of "Selfless", "Merciless", etc. Think lots of melodic and droning guitars (notes and chords), pummeling chord progressions (some a bit more rhythmic and involved than others), a definite sense of dark atmosphere mixed with a lot of tasteful discordance, the works. And somehow, despite a certain lack of variety and the absence of vocals, they manage to keep things interesting and intense for as long as 13 minutes at a time. Not too shabby. The longer tracks like "Forecast for Today" and "The Woods" have a bit more to offer as far as tempo changes and dynamics, but the approach is still very consistent and basically straightforward ("The Woods" definitely has more subtle complexities though). The production is fucking huge. Everything sounds warm and natural, and it's all about density and texture. The drums are massive, the bass tone is thick and throbs away in the center, and the guitars are heavy as hell with tons of gritty detail - from rumbling low-end crunch to bright, resonant sustain. Awesome. As usual the layout looks slick. It's all in dark gray and black with some metallic silver ink, and the background textures are abstract, while most everything else is text. The band name and precise start/stop times of each track are repeated several times, some brief recording information is inside the booklet, and underneath the CD tray is a quote from "Arcana: Musicians on Music". Other than that there's just a tiny high contrast icon of a face. The entire presentation is simple enough, but looks awesome. This is great stuff. I might like to hear them incorporate some sort of vocals in the future, granted they don't necessarily need to... but even as an instrumental unit they're working wonders. Check this out. (8/10)
Running time - 29:24, Tracks: 4
[Notable tracks: all four are fucking great]
Hydra Head Records - http://www.hydrahead.com

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