Simply days into 2023, Sleep Token had been on the epicentre of an unprecedented second. With none prior discover, they unleashed two new singles, ‘Chokehold’ and ‘The Summoning’ on consecutive days, and made themselves various music’s new favorite subject of dialog. The previous’s jaw-dropping riffs and the latter’s sultry fusion of metallic and funk had their Spotify month-to-month listeners quintupling in a fortnight, and but, no one knew who these masked musicians had been. With their identities hid beneath masks and cloaks, and each a wealthy, fantastical origin story and an enormous cult fanbase behind them, Sleep Token had been luring within the lots whereas letting their music converse for itself.
Doubters dismissed their shadowy anonymity and eclectic sound as a gimmick, however this band’s star isn’t burning out. The success of these singles was no accident. In actual fact, even past ‘Chokehold’ and ‘The Summoning’, there’s a complete different 48 minutes or so of daring, beautiful music on ‘Take Me Again To Eden’ that may pour chilly water on any suggestion that Sleep Token’s is a flash-in-the-pan success.
Loads of artists of their ilk undertake a genre-fluid strategy, however on ‘Take Me Again To Eden’, Sleep Token stretches that idea to its restrict. Whereas rooted in metallic they attain additional into different genres than most bands would dare. In principle, the darkly seductive, piano-laden R&B quantity ‘Aqua Regia’ shouldn’t rub up wherever close to a tune just like the lacerating black-metal impressed ‘Vore’, however the distinction in sounds between these two songs feels purposeful moderately than confused.
Certainly, their unpredictability, greater than ever, is a part of their very essence, and there’s so much right here that seasoned Sleep Token followers will recognise as unchartered territory. They’ve even tried their very own staple arena-rock ballad within the type of ‘Are You Actually Okay?’, for instance, a gorgeous however agonisingly uncooked tune bearing on psychological well being and self-harm that ends with frontman Vessel begging “Please don’t harm your self once more.”
The sharpest turns arrive in two prolonged tracks, ‘Ascensionism’ and ‘Take Me Again To Eden’, which weave between starkly totally different sounds – hushed piano, ethereal synths, dagger-like djent, and bursts of R&B that toy with autotune and lure drums – with breathtaking grace. By treating every style like a motion in a classical piece, nothing ever jars, the place in much less expert palms, it so simply might.
There’s extra dangers on ‘Take Me Again To Eden’ than Sleep Token have ever taken earlier than, however there’s by no means a possibility to doubt whether or not something they try will succeed. It’s an formidable, emotional monolith of a file, with all of the hallmarks of future traditional standing.
Particulars
- Launch date: Might 19, 2023
- Report label: Spinefarm
