Yeah, it’s more of the same.
Just figured I’d come right out and say it up front instead of taking four paragraphs to get to it. But like the old saying goes, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. And fix it The Ocean don’t.
The concept behind Pelagial is that every song is named after the different layers of the ocean (descending from Pelagial all the way down to Benthic) with the tuning and lyrical content drifting on doooooooowwwwwnnnn while occasionally becoming appropriately violent. It works for the most part, but I think it might go over a lot of listeners' heads if they weren’t either A) informed ahead of time, or B) an oceanographer. Betcha know which one of those I was.
Instrumentally, Pelagial don't seem to stray too far from the usual formula of Mariana Trench scraping bass lines and wispy, progressive riffs with a mixture of ADD-addled drum work versus slow and jazzy fills and thrills. Like I said, nothing really new here.
But the fact of the matter is it don't amount to shit when it’s as good as this. The progressive side of The Ocean always seems to outshine the sludge/core aspect. This has been true from Fluxion to Anthropocentric and remains to be just as true in Pelagial. The addition of an instrumental version of Pelagial is a nice touch, albeit a useless one since the “normal” version is superior due to Loïc Rossetti's mastery of the hardcore bellow and mild clean vocals.
It’s powerful, massive, rolling, deep, and constantly changing while ultimately staying the same. It’s The goddamned Ocean.
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