Pelican

Instrumental rock quartet Pelican has markedly evolved in recent years. Perhaps it's because the band moved from its hometown of Chicago to the sunnier climes of Los Angeles. For where the earliest Pelican material skated around the borders of metal, the band's sound has distinctly softened as time has passed. Not that this softening should be taken as weakening — the songs on the group's latest album, last year's City of Echoes, were aggressive as ever. But mixed into the driving, circular riffage were mellower passages in which melody floated to the fore.

The band last appeared in South Florida this past spring, opening for Circa Survive and Thrice at Revolution. Pelican was stuck in a too-early opening slot for an audience mostly unfamiliar with the band, so the sublime power of the group's live show went sorely underappreciated. Headlining the Culture Room should do the band well; Pelican's epic levels of pure volume, bouncing off the walls of an intimate venue, should create an engulfing vortex of stormy sound.