When Pelican released Forever Becoming in 2013, the band found themselves at a pivotal moment. After four years of relative silence and the departure of founding guitarist Laurent Schroeder-Lebec, many wondered whether the Chicago instrumental quartet could maintain their creative spark. The answer came in the form of an album that both honored their past and redefined their future a record that channels transformation into sound.
Recorded at Electrical Audio Studios with Sanford Parker, Forever Becoming captures Pelican in motion. The music feels charged with renewal, heavier and more urgent than their previous output, yet still rooted in the shimmering melodic sensibility that defines their best work. From the first surge of Deny the Absolute, the band’s precision and purpose are unmistakable. Guitars grind and soar, bass and drums interlock with precision, and every moment carries an undertone of tension and release.
This is not a reinvention but a reaffirmation. Pelican sound as if they’ve stripped their identity down to its essentials riffs, atmosphere, weight and rebuilt it with confidence. The album’s middle section, with tracks like Immutable Dusk and Perpetual Dawn, broadens the emotional range: moments of introspection rise out of crushing heaviness, suggesting resilience in the face of uncertainty.
Despite its intensity, Forever Becoming maintains a sense of space. The production allows each instrument to breathe, letting the band’s interplay drive the emotional narrative. The result is a sound that is massive yet alive, detailed without being sterile.
If there’s criticism to be made, it’s that a few tracks lean on familiar Pelican patterns the slow builds, the post-metal crescendos, the cyclical climaxes. Yet even these moments feel earned rather than formulaic. The record’s flow and cohesion make it one of the band’s most focused efforts since The Fire in Our Throats Will Beckon the Thaw.
In the end, Forever Becoming is less about arrival than movement. It reflects a band in transition older, sharper, and deeply aware of their place in a genre they helped shape. Pelican don’t chase trends or attempt reinvention for its own sake; instead, they refine their sound into something both timeless and personal.
