Eric Wiersema writesIn Rotation: Pelican

by Eric Wiersema

Pelican | Nighttime Stories | Southern Lord

Chicago post-metallers Pelican return with their sixth album, following up 2013’s Forever Becoming. The band continues to do with they do best - pump out high-quality atmospheric post-metal that experiments with a wide variety of sounds and textures. The closest sonic comparison I can make is to fellow Chicagoans Russian Circles. However, Pelican’s music is generally heavier and takes less influence from shoegaze and lighter post-rock acts such as Explosions in the Sky than the latter.

Nighttime Stories opens with the folk-tinged “WST” that laments the death of friend and Tusk bandmate Jody Minnoch. The album starts getting heavier on “Midnight and Mescaline,” which is primarily dominated by prog influences sounding similar to Animals as Leaders but with some darker undertones. “Cold Hope” is a thick, heavy, atmospheric track that incorporates doom influences. Finally, the closer “Full Moon Black Water” incorporates many influences from the previous tracks and melds them all into one.