The Maccabees - Pelican

When DIY settled down to interrogate The Maccabees recently (more on that in the next issue of our magazine - Ed), they seemed to be a band filled with ambition. Considering they’re about to embark on their really difficult third album campaign, there was the suggestion that the boys have something rather special hidden in their collective Macca-sleeves. Clearly that was no understatement; in ‘Pelican’ the five piece have returned with something that sounds capable of splitting the airwaves wide open.

Produced by DFA man Tim Goldsworthy, there’s a sense of both scale and punch that supersedes everything the Brighton band have offered up to date. Whilst still identifiable as The Maccabees of yore, ‘Pelican’ is infused with a new level of maturity, switching effortlessly between scattergun, angular guitar pop and a blissed out post-euphoric high. Orlando Weeks’ vocals ascend over layers of unpredicatable melody, common sense dictates that so many musical twists and turns in the space of only three minutes should equate to an utter mess of a track. Yet ‘Pelican’ sounds much more akin to an epic triumph instead.

As the first taster of forthcoming album ‘Given To The Wild’ - a self proclaimed ‘ambitious album’ - ‘Pelican’ implies that the days of dismissing the Maccabees as either landfill indie or Arcade Fire postulants should be left far behind them. Instead we’re left with the impression that, rather than falling flat on their faces with their third full length, The Maccabees could be set to soar higher than ever before.