Pelican's songs touch on so much from the canon of rock music. Yet they have refined their own sound over the course of their career--perhaps nowhere as progressively and courageously as on their third full-length, City of Echoes. When the quartet's first full length, Australasia, came out in late 2003, it was an experiment in crushing heaviness, albeit melodic and compositionally a breed apart from their contemporaries. Whereas earlier material was imbued in a minor-chorded wall of sound, Pelican aimed skyward in full embrace of major keys and overtly uplifting melodies.