Recently, I’ve spent a lot of time listening to and discovering Sleep Token. They are so amazing and different. They have become one of the relatively newer bands to put attention to, especially this last album. Take Me Back To Eden, which is now my favorite album of the year 2023, so far, and maybe it could be one of the favorites of my life because it’s an overwhelming masterpiece.
The Band
Sleep Token is a British rock band from London, England, formed in 2016. The group is an anonymous collective, that hides behind masks. Led by their singer Vessel, who also plays the rest of the instruments, except drums (the drummer’s technique is unbelievable). For playing live, they add other musicians.
They play spiritual progressive metal that gets you in like a hypnotic trance, that sometimes includes R&B and some other sounds. All played by these crazy talented guys.
Vessel’s voice is so particular, warm, and emotive. There is a heaviness in his voice, like emotional tiredness or sadness, that gives you chills and goosebumps. He expresses his vulnerability through his voice, haunting, but sexy too. It just brings you in. It transports and absorbs you to another world. So much variety. He also plays with his own breathing and whispering when singing.
Vessel, apart from having a beautifully soothing, and unique voice and being an amazing multi-instrumentalist. He is a wonderful lyricist too. His words are so poetic, it’s unreal. Beautiful way of expressing himself, of putting his thoughts and feelings into these sung poems.
The story says that Vessel had a dream in which an ancient deity called Sleep appeared to him, so he began making music to worship this god.
This idea of hiding behind masks or makeup is not new in rock. The same happened with Ghost, Slipknot, Kiss, and black metal bands. The mystery attracts, but it has to be accompanied by great music, by substance, and luckily this band, has it in excess. Vessel has expressed that the important thing is the music and not their identities.
Take Me Back to Eden is their third studio album. It was released on May 19th, 2023.
Regarding their videos, most of them are visualizers, that seem fighting avatars for video games.
The Songs
1. Chokehold: the first song, and one of my favorites of the album. Toxic love. “When we were made, it was no accident…”
2. The Summoning: this was the first song I’ve heard from them. I was watching the charismatic voice, a YouTube reaction channel of Elizabeth Zharoff, an opera singer and vocal coach. She was watching this video with Will Ramos, Lorna Shore’s singer (that’s how I got to know Lorna Shore too), and Will talked about Sleep Token with so much passion, that I was caught by their spell too.
The song is so spectacular. Love song. Still my favorite of this album. It has so many music styles in one song. Goes from progressive parts to super energetic primal and heavy beats. The guitar solo reminds me of Dream Theater, and the last part, which is so unexpected, a funky groovy part, that some have described as “sexy core” or “baby-making music”.
You go through different emotions through this song, the same as throughout the whole album.
3. Granite: it’s like a spite R&B song, with a heavy touch at the end.
4. Aqua Regia: love ballad. Beautiful piano. The name of the song refers to a special corrosive liquid that is capable of dissolving noble metals like gold. So, an interpretation could be that she has the capacity to melt or destroy him, so he’s trying not to fall under her spell again.
5. Vore: the term refers to a sexual fetish of swallowing someone or being swallowed by someone. It applies to the song in the sense that she is no longer present in his life (maybe passed away) and he wants her to devour him or that something devours both of them, so they can be together. This is the heaviest song of the album, very intense, with harsh vocals.
6. Ascensionism: it begins beautifully with a piano, ballad. Then comes the rap and a great guitar solo with a heavier part. Love this song.
Just as with most of the album, the lyrics are about a toxic relationship.
7. Are You Really Okay?: beautiful start. He begs someone to not hurt themselves, about someone who inflicts self-harm. Gives me a lot of sadness to listen to it, but it’s so marvelous at the same time. He can’t heal her wounds.
It gives me the impression of being a child lullaby but with so much anguish.
8. The Apparition: sad. She is no longer here but keeps appearing to him in his dreams and vanishes when he wakes up. So, he asks her to get together in dreamland, to let him go or to take him with her. Hip-hop song, with a heavy chorus.
9. DYWTYLM: (do you wish that you loved me?). It’s like a summer sad pop song, with hip-hop, and a kind of Hawaiian vibe. His love is unrequited.
10. Rain: it’s a rap that transforms into a rock ballad. Piano, love, sad, rain sounds. Breaking up song.
11. Take Me Back to Eden: it’s the title track and an absolutely delightful piece. It refers to going back to paradise, where he was happy. It starts as a sad ballad. He misses her because she left. He asks her to take him with her or that they come back together. Heavy and then rap. The beautiful celestial chorus gives me goosebumps.
“And no amount of love will keep it around if we don’t choose it”…
Heavy breakdown at the end.
Multiple layers and feels, synth (to make nature sounds, like birds, at the beginning). The ambiance of this song involves you.
One of my favorite songs on the album (along with Chokehold and The Summoning).
It has a great call back to Chokehold: “When we were made, it was no accident”.
12. Euclid: piano, R&B, with heavy parts. Love song. He knows they’re not going to be together anymore, but he asks her one more night. This song has a callback in the lyrics to other songs, the same as Take Me Back To Eden with Chokehold. And also, legend says that their previous two albums are also related, making a supreme trilogy. I haven’t listened to their previous work yet, so that is yet to come.
Final Thoughts
This work is so eclectic, you never know how it’s going to continue. It’s not a very heavy album, except for some breakdowns. You have to be in a very receptive mood to listen to it because it’s so different. However, the good thing about this, is that any person, a fan of hip hop, metal, funk, progressive rock, jazz, pop, etc., could like it. The music is top quality, and it can help people to break down their musical barriers and prejudice and just enjoy a good album.
Their songs are slowly building up. Experimental metal, massive sound, that merges different musical genres. Melancholic tones. Sad but very musically complex. Vessel’s voice is haunting, gorgeous, and ethereal. It absorbs you from the first moment you hear it.
The album is about relationships and toxic love. He was in a dark place, and he gets out of that darkness just as each song passes by, it’s about his journey. A very emotional one. The songs are long, but you’re so mesmerized by them, that they seem shorter than they are and on the contrary, you wish that they were even longer.
Listening to Sleep Token, it’s an experience. And since it’s genre-fluid, it mixes so many musical styles, giving the album variety and enriching it. It can’t be exactly defined, they’re a genre on its own. Their music gets you through different emotional estates along the album and even in every song, so just listen to them and enjoy the ride.