Jury's Top Ten Records of 2013: #6

#6: Pelican – Forever Becoming: 

 Very, very good. I keep picking up little snatches of things that remind me of previous Pelican recordings which is just fine by me; I liked those recordings. A few tracks may well have evolved from the cuts on the Ataraxsis/Taraxsis EP. Not ground breaking and probably not their best record, but still a quite solid album nonetheless.

Some other stuff I heard:
Ewphoria – Ewphoria: Dissonant, quirky, slightly grimy (is that where the Ew comes from?), somewhat ambient at times and unexpectedly enjoyable. These mostly short tracks don’t overstay their welcome, and are reminiscent of a less-melodic but richer sounding Severed Heads with a dash of Bran Van 3000.
Gorguts – Coloured Sands: Impeccably played, hugely inventive, easily transcends anything resembling death metal, yet not as noodly or proggy as had been described to me. There’s a lot to like on this record, with fully committed vocals and some brutal percussion and, yet, many of the nine tracks sound an awful lot alike and, ultimately, fail to keep me interested. The classical-styled Battle of Chamdo is well executed but ridiculously out of place here.