The Problem With Sleep Token

My honest assessment of the new Sleep Token album. I’m not sure why I’m writing this, as this isn’t a music review site, they’re ten a penny as it is. But, I felt the urge to write my thoughts down on this one.

I’ve been a fan of Sleep Token since they released Jaws. When my friend first showed me Jaws, pardon the pun, but my Jaw was on the floor. I’d never heard anything quite like it. There was a dark, brooding atmosphere, it was heavy, there were electronic elements that felt modern (metal bands tend to be grossly out of touch when adding electronic elements…), and there was this big poppy chorus. It was catchy, accessible, yet had something gritty about it at the same time.

I listened to the EP’s they released over and over again. Calcutta, Jericho, Nazareth, still to this day are some of my favourite tracks. The song-writing was excellent. Vessel’s voice, albeit slightly sketchy at times felt emotive and raw. The instrumentation was enough to keep my interest, without drowning out the more subtle electronic elements. It was the perfect storm for a new obsession.

When Sleep Token released their first full album ‘Sundowning’, it took me a little while to get into it. The mix of elements from their first EPs felt like they’d been rebalanced slightly, it was more poppy, slightly more accessible, but I was along for the ride.

Their second full length album, ‘This Place Will Become Your Tomb’, felt like they were experimenting with styles more, throwing more elements into the air to see what sticks. But I actually liked that, some of my favourite tracks of theirs are off that album. Some, in fact, were some of the softer tracks on the album. Take ‘Missing Limbs’, for example.

When ‘Take Me Back to Eden’ was released, it was at the height of my obsession. This album had far more pop elements to it, including slightly amateurish sounding Trap beats. I didn’t mind that. It still felt like they were pushing boundaries, I enjoyed hearing them approach new and different genres, whilst wrapping things up with the same Djent adjacent signature heavy parts.

I must admit, once the novelty of Take Me Back to Eden wore off, I found I rarely came back to that album. When in the mood for Sleep Token, I would delve all the way back to their first EP’s, including their first (which I found a little too rough when I first got into them). That grew on me, and I think that’s because I was pining for more of Sleep Token of that era. Prior to the lore, prior to the gimmicks.

I hoped (perhaps naively, given they’ve just signed to a major, largely pop music label, RCA), Even in Arcadia might be a ‘back to the roots’ album. But, instead, we got a hodgepodge of previously done gimmicks. Not just that, but they seemed to have doubled, if not tripled down on those gimmicks.

The problem with gimmicks and novelty, is you can only really do them a few times before you get figured out. After that, it just becomes predictable again. This raises the issue of relying on gimmicks, once you’ve done it, it’s not new anymore. Gimmicks then, are weaponised against you. To illustrate that point, no one gets annoyed at Lamb of God for releasing another straight-up metal record. That’s because they never made a claim to be anything else. There’s no expectation for them to blend genres.

Sleep Token, however, had a lot of success on blending unlikely genres and pop music. But that left them very little wiggle room for commercial success. The Trap beats and metal breakdowns gave them a lot of chart success, but where do they go from there? They’ve decided to hone in on that formula, to the point where the metal sections feel tokenistic, as though they suddenly remembered they were supposed to be a metal band, and shoehorned in a few heavy bits last minute. This is a recipe for short-term chart success, but they risk becoming a pop group with the odd heavy bit. They’ve almost certainly alienated their 2017/2018 fanbase.

Other metal bands have successful gimmicks. Zeal & Ardor spring to mind, they have a music gimmick in Deep South, Delta Blues elements. They even have a thematic gimmick, sorry a ‘lore’. I don’t get bored of their shtick. Largely because it works, largely because they retained a consistent mix. They’ve more or less kept to the Metal with Delta Blues vibes, and focussed on making really good music within that constraint.

Sleep Token on the other hand have made a point of being novel by throwing more into the mix. Chasing novelty by adding more novelty. Rather than evolving their novelty. The result is, they’ve overshot the runway somewhat. What’s left is an all-you-can-eat buffet of popular genres, not particularly well done, with some heavy bits, just to remind everyone they’re still technically a metal band.

Although I love TPWBYT, I do feel as though that’s the album where it started to all go wrong. That’s the album where they started throwing more and more elements into the mix. If they had stuck to the path of Sundowning, and honed in on that overall style, sure, it might have taken them longer to reach commercial success (if ever), but that mix was coherent and they would have retained the fans that got into them because they saw them live at ArcTanGent, who would have been far less fickle.

The problem with chart success is, after you’ve spent a few weeks in the top whatever charts, as soon as they change direction again, those fans will be onto the next big thing. Whereas, the ‘saw you live at ArcTanGent’ fans, were likely more forgiving and understanding of changes in direction.

Perhaps I’m the perfect example, I stuck with them for two full albums, based off their early work and knowing what they’re capable of, before they lost my interest with a slightly incoherent pop album with metal bits. And despite that, I will still listen, forgivingly and longingly to the next few releases they put out. They won’t get that from their chart success fans.

But, ultimately, it’s their choice. Maybe chart success was what they were after. It seems slightly unlikely, given they’re anonymous (well, if you want them to be).

Even the thematic gimmick (the whole god named Sleep thing), has taken a back seat in this latest album, as though they knew their commercial success would be hindered by what the average pop music fan would see as ‘weird culty stuff’. No longer battling with a fictional deity, instead, now battling with fame, the fans and what sounds like an ex? So the gimmicks musically and thematically are now inconsistent.

My plea to Sleep Token would be, either go back to your roots next album. Or make a pop album and be done with it.

I was incredibly dismayed when Opeth released their first full-on prog-rock album. My favourite Opeth album, by far, was Ghost Reveries. I wanted Ghost Reveries over and over again. But what turned up a couple of albums later, was Hawkwind (no disrespect to Hawkwind, I actually quite like Hawkwind). But, I accepted that, because that’s just what they were doing now. The problem with Sleep Token is, they keep trying to keep one foot in the door by including ‘metal bits’.

It seems silly to ask Sleep Token to ‘pick a lane’, but I wish they’d pick two, maybe three lanes, top, and put more focus and time into those lanes. Focus on making those lanes more coherent, develop those elements more.