Audio Mixer: Chris Common.

Photographer: Andrew Weiss.

One had to wonder what Pelican's signing to Southern Lord could possibly mean. To be truthful, while the band did write and perform more structurally formal material on 2007's CITY OF ECHOES, they retained their trademark post-metal aesthetic -- percussive repetition, overtone basslines, and nuanced guitar riffing. On WHAT WE ALL COME TO NEED, they have taken it not a step further, but a step more inside that aesthetic. The concentration here is on songwriting rather than riffing. There is a decidedly more melodic bent here than on any of the band's previous releases, and yet, given the album's production -- it was produced, engineered, and mixed by Chris Common -- it's also heavier, if that's possible. WHAT WE ALL COME TO NEEDis decidedly more lyrical, though it's also more powerful post-metal. The deliberate muddiness and "sonic thud" on their former recordings is gone here, making this the most sonically and compositionally accessible album they've cut thus far.

Alternative Press (p.116) - 4 stars out of 5 -- "WHAT WE ALL COME TO NEED finds Pelican mastering their post-metal craft while indulging the ambitious curiosities they hinted at on 2007's CITY OF ECHOES."