“How we obtained right here is as irrelevant as who we’re – what issues is the music and the message.”
So Sleep Token singer Vessel advised Steel Hammer in 2017, within the very first interview this mysterious determine ever performed, and one in every of solely a scant handful that has been completed since. Besides that quote isn’t fairly correct.
Who Sleep Token are behind the masks and underneath the robes is probably not a priority to a fanbase deeply protecting of the band’s true identities, however their journey from tech steel curios to the most important success story of the 2020s is a distinct matter.
Since releasing their debut single, Thread The Needle, again in 2016, Sleep Token’s fame has grown exponentially. Put up-pandemic specifically, their ascent has been dizzying, with Sleep Token headlining arenas within the UK and US and, most impressively, about to headline Obtain’s Foremost Stage.
The mystique surrounding the band has performed a giant half of their recognition, however there’s extra to it than the spectral hand of Sleep, the mysterious deity that guides the band (in line with the mythology). That is how Sleep Token turned probably the most profitable steel band of the last decade, within the phrases of a few of the individuals who had been a part of it.
Sleep Token had been shrouded in thriller from the beginning. The preliminary idea of an nameless band was in place even earlier than they launched a observe of music, as was a broad model of the lore on which the band could be constructed, although Vessel was initially generally known as ‘Him’.
George Lever [Sleep Token producer 2016-2021]: “The place to begin was eradicating this concept of the music you take heed to being associated to the particular person making it. By being nameless, the listener is compelled to narrate to what they’re really listening to.”
James Monteith [Tesseract guitarist/publicist at Hold Tight PR]: “We used to run the press space of [UK tech metal festival] Techfest and, in 2016, I used to be approached by Tom Quigley, who was a scene common and ran a number of blogs on the time. He mentioned he was working with this new band, would we possibly be desirous about doing their press? We ended up speaking for an hour, and he rolled out the entire idea, the imagery and all the things about it… apart from the music.”
George Lever: “The lore/narrative was fairly unfastened nonetheless, but it surely undoubtedly existed.”
James Monteith: “There was nothing particular as such, extra this concept of making an occult vibe and feeling, led by this prophet-like character who leads a faith. I bear in mind pondering, ‘That is all very fascinating, however the place’s the music?’”
The broader world obtained their first style of Sleep Token in September 2016 with the discharge of Thread The Needle, a tune whose haunting ambiance, light piano and emotive vocals had been punctuated by jarring tech metal-style breakdowns. The tune was accompanied by a video that includes summary visuals that gave no clue as to the band’s identification.
It was adopted three months later by the self-released three-track One EP, which introduced them to the eye of Basick Information, who had helped break bands reminiscent of Enter Shikari, Sikth and Bury Tomorrow.
George Lever: “Lots of the primary EP was really us making an attempt stuff out. We recorded the drums on a whim at Monnow Valley Studio in Wales. I launched him to one in every of my mates, who really nonetheless drums in them now.”
Nathan Barley Phillips [co-founder of Basick Records]: “I actually favored One. We [Basick] wished to place one thing collectively the place we may amplify what Sleep Token had been and what they had been doing. It was nonetheless comparatively scrappy at the moment, but it surely was clear there was a imaginative and prescient from day one.”
James Monteith: “We shared an workplace with Nathan, so we mentioned it with him. Then an electronic mail popped into our inbox with one of many early demos of Calcutta [which would eventually appear on 2017’s Two EP]. All of it clicked immediately. I’d by no means heard something prefer it earlier than. It gave the impression of Meshuggah combined with Bon Iver.”
Nathan Barley Phillips: “Individuals assumed everybody obtained onboard from day one, however that wasn’t the case. There have been some raised eyebrows across the anonymity and the presentation, even the songwriting.”
James Monteith: “Within the tech steel world there was plenty of buzz and pleasure early on, however exterior of that it gave the impression to be actually gradual going. The press didn’t actually know what to make of it.”
Nathan Barley Phillips: “In its easiest phrases, we described it as ‘Sam Smith meets Meshuggah’. These had been the layman’s phrases we used to explain it to individuals who won’t get it. Consider me, there have been individuals in these early days who didn’t!”
A part of the rationale behind that bafflement was attributable to the truth that the band didn’t give interviews – even the equally nameless Ghost had spoken to the media of their early days underneath a pseudonym. In Might 2017, they lastly relented and performed their very first interview, completed through electronic mail for Steel Hammer’s web site.
James Monteith: “We at all times obtained requests, however the band mentioned from the beginning they had been nameless and wouldn’t do them. It helped create extra curiosity as a result of no one may get entry to them.”
Matt Benton: “You’ll be able to’t do an introductory piece with out an interview. We managed to get an settlement [from Sleep Token] for an electronic mail interview with Steel Hammer. Even then, the band knew they didn’t need to have a voice.”
Nathan Barley Phillips: “There have been plenty of choices that had been super-interesting to be concerned with, particularly in that improvement stage the place we had been making choices about the way it was introduced, the language we might use, whether or not we should always do interviews. That was the acorn that knowledgeable plenty of how issues are nonetheless dealt with right this moment.”
Vessel (within the Steel Hammer interview): “As musicians we’re impressed by the human situation and a plethora of artists, however we’re deeply moved by His phrases and proceed to do our utmost to convey them to life. As followers we’re sure by an obligation to mix our crafts to create music that conveys a few of our most primal, and highly effective feelings.”
Matt Benton: “It’s one in every of only some interviews they’ve ever completed. It’s one thing I’m glad exists, as a result of it’s like getting the Phrase Of God.”
Sleep Token’s second EP, Two, was launched in July 2017. It discovered the band increasing their mixture of tech steel, metalcore, pop and R’n’B throughout its three tracks. The thrill across the band was rising, regardless of the very fact they’d but to play reside – a mooted headlining present at Camden’s Black Coronary heart pub was scrapped once they obtained a suggestion to assist Norwegian psych rockers Motorpyscho at London’s Islington Academy in October 2017.
A month later, they opened for synthwave trailblazer Perturbator at ULU in Central London.
George Lever: “I had freedom to supply interpretations of what I used to be listening to. It was a really lucky mixture of personalities and beliefs. There was by no means any, ‘We’re going to take over the world’-type chat. It was extra, ‘Can we like this?’ ‘Let’s do extra of that.’”
Nathan Barley Phillips: “After Two got here out, I began getting calls from reserving brokers and promoters who I’d not heard from shortly. They wished to talk to me about Sleep Token.”
Matt Benton: “The primary time seeing them within the flesh onstage was fairly unusual. They had been carrying these fairly rudimentary masks. However even on the Motorpsycho present, there have been some individuals there who very clearly knew the songs. After they did the Outkast cowl [Hey Ya!, originally released in 2017], you can hear a pin drop. Vessel had such a command of the room via his vocals – one thing that’s probably not modified.”
James Kent [Perturbator]: “We’d been given a number of choices for bands that wished to open that present, however I bear in mind choosing them as a result of I assumed they sounded actually good.”
Kamran Haq [promoter and Download festival booker]: “The Perturbator gig was extra like a showcase for Sleep Token. Lots of people had by no means seen or heard the band earlier than however had been blown away: ‘What the fuck is that this?!’”
Matt Benton: “You may see this was a band who had been discovering their ft and organically rising. They’d such a robust thought of who they wished to be each on- and offstage.”
James Kent: “It sounded and regarded so good, so skilled. I had no thought it was solely their second present.”
The calculated warning surrounding Sleep Token’s early reside appearances quickly evaporated. After opening for Detest and Holding Absence in Manchester and London in March 2018, they hit the pageant circuit arduous that 12 months, taking part in The Nice Escape in Might, Obtain in June (on the fourth stage), Techfest in July, and Studying and Leeds in August, squeezing in a session for Radio 1’s Rock Present amid all of it.
Matt Benton: “The Nice Escape was the primary level they’d began to get business legitimacy. There was nonetheless a way of, ‘Who is that this band? What are they gonna do?’”
Kamran Haq: “That Nice Escape present was unimaginable. It was super-hot and the room was completely packed – you couldn’t transfer in there. I reckon they solely performed 4 songs. But it surely was particular too as a result of it was the primary time plenty of tastemakers had been seeing the band.”
Adam Ryan [Great Escape festival director]: “By way of acts that will go on to essentially blow up, we had Fontaines D.C., Sam Fender, Slowthai… It was a implausible 12 months. However Sleep Token ended up being the discuss of the pageant.”
Nathan Barley Phillips: “Making an attempt to maintain some sense of anonymity was an actual mission. Significantly getting them to and from the stage with out anybody seeing who they had been.”
James Monteith: “Techfest felt like a pleasant full-circle factor, as a result of that’s the place we’d first heard the idea and now they had been taking part in to a very overpacked room. It was the primary time I knew one thing particular was occurring – we’d by no means seen something prefer it earlier than.”
For all of the rising reside exercise, Sleep Token had but to play their very own headline present. That modified on October 11, 2018, once they carried out on the intimate and atmospheric St Pancras Previous Church in North London.
James Monteith: “It was their first sell-out occasion, which additionally turned a giant a part of their legend.”
Matt Benton: “That was the primary affirmation that what they had been doing was going to work. The whole lot actually picked up from there too.”
Nathan Barley Phillips: “It actually felt like a coming of age for the band. It was the primary second the place all the things felt totally fashioned and totally realised. It was like, ‘That is what it may very well be.’ You may hint a kernel of a few of the issues they had been doing on the St Pancras present to a few of the huge reveals they’ve completed since.”
Having signed to Spinefarm Information, a subsidiary of main label Common, Sleep Token spent the early a part of 2019 recording debut album Sundowning with George Lever in a studio in Wells, Somerset. The primary tune from the album, The Evening Does Not Belong To God, was launched in June 2019, with every subsequent tune dropping on YouTube at sundown at fortnightly intervals.
By the point the album was launched in November 2019, the band had already launched into their first US tour, opening for metalcore outfit Points on a invoice that additionally featured Polyphia and rapper Lil Aaron.
George Lever: “We did Sundowning in three months – we went from demo to last grasp being launched in simply 12 weeks. We didn’t have days off; we’d do seven within the morning till seven, eight and even 9 at evening each day for 3 months. We had been in one another’s pockets; we’d go to the fitness center collectively, swim, do the sauna… All these items to get better from being sat down on a regular basis. There was plenty of time to spend holistically being mates making this report. We didn’t know learn how to make this factor, however we had a confidence that we’d get there ultimately. That’s my favorite three-month interval of my life.”
Skyler Acord [Issues bassist]: “Our reserving agent despatched us this EP Sleep Token had launched and I used to be blown away. It felt like I may see the longer term. Often, you stroll in in the course of the opener and get a beer and discuss as loud as you’ll be able to, proper? However everybody was engaged. It was like seeing Slipknot in ’99 or one thing, besides, it was totally different from the nu steel of yore. Lots of that had this trailer park, ‘I’m insane!’ vibe. Sleep Token is poetic – much less malt liquor, extra wine.”
Sleep Token had been on an upswing as they entered 2020. Their first UK headlining tour in January noticed them return to Islington Academy, the place they’d performed their first gig as openers for Motorpsycho simply over two years earlier.
The plan was to enter the studio in March 2020 to report their second album, This Place Will Grow to be Your Tomb, with producer George Lever. Then Covid upended all the things.
George Lever: “We began making that album and the primary day was when lockdowns started. Tomb… was robust for all of us emotionally. There have been way of life pressures on account of the lockdown that made it not very conducive to creating artwork that’s purported to be welcomed or welcoming. Lots of these songs are, in a method or one other, about love, love being misplaced or regret, they’re compassionate tales which can be designed to convey the listener in direction of the artist. It’s arduous to do this when it feels just like the world goes to finish.”
This Place Will Grow to be Your Tomb was ultimately launched on September 24, 2021, three months after Sleep Token made a memorable look at Obtain Pilot, the primary main post-Covid pageant. It reached No.39 within the UK charts, giving the band their first High 40 album.
Since then, devotion in direction of the band has solely intensified. In January 2023, Sleep Token put out singles Chokehold and The Summoning, the latter going viral on TikTok, resulting in a dramatic improve of their streaming numbers.
When third album Take Me Again To Eden was launched in Might, it hit No.3 within the charts. In December, Sleep Token performed Wembley Enviornment – their first ever area headlining present. Only a 12 months later, they carried out on the 20,000-capacity O2 Enviornment in London.
James Monteith: “In January 2023, Tesseract ended up taking part in a pageant with them within the Netherlands. Architects had been the highest of the invoice, we had been fundamental assist, then Northlane had been beneath us and Sleep Token had been opening. Inside 12 months, they had been an area band. Loopy!”
Kamran Haq: “It took Convey Me The Horizon 10 years to get into arenas. Architects, 14 years… Sleep Token did it in lower than 5. It’s fairly nuts.”
On March 13, 2025, Sleep Token launched Emergence, the primary single from their massively anticipated fourth album, Even In Arcadia. It was adopted on April 4 by one other new tune, Caramel.
As is common in Sleep Token’s world, all the things is enveloped in enigma – a web based puzzle gave followers a alternative between ‘Home Veridian’ and ‘Feathered Host’, with no clarification as to what both was or how they plug into the broader Sleep Token lore. However as soon as once more, the silence has solely fed the urge for food of followers, one thing underlined by their upcoming debut headlining look at Obtain pageant in June, and their subsequent US area tour later this 12 months.
Kamran Haq: “To go from taking part in Obtain’s fourth stage to headlining the pageant is spectacular. I don’t suppose we’ve ever had it occur, particularly in such a brief house of time. The one factor I can equate it to is one thing like My Chemical Romance or Linkin Park.”
Matt Benton: “Sleep Token have grow to be an business in their very own proper. I’ve obtained mates in merchandising they usually say Sleep Token shift extra merch than another UK heavy band – greater than even Iron Maiden.”
James Kent: “The imagery undoubtedly helped. The very fact it’s all fairly accessible too – they’ve plenty of R’n’B, electronica, some aggressive djenty stuff… it’s gateway. I had no thought it’d blow up prefer it has. Now I’d like to open for them!”
Nathan Barley Phillips: “Bands like Ghost and Sleep Token aren’t profitable as a result of they put on masks. They’re profitable as a result of they write nice music. Masks don’t imply something if the music isn’t any good.”
Matt Benton: “I’ll have an interest to see, when the primary official TV film of the band will get made, the distinction between the truth of what occurred and the story that will get advised. In a manner, the parable turns into the truth.”
Kamran Haq: “All of us thought the band was particular, however no one in one million years thought they may very well be what they’re now.”
Even In Arcadia is out now through RCA. Sleep Token headline Obtain Pageant on June 14 and tour the US later this 12 months.