A band that has truly taken its mantle in our daily lives through the power of Tiktok, Sleep Token the British rock band from London has been an undeniable force within the rock scene. Formed in 2016, the group are an anonymous, masked collective led by a frontman using the moniker Vessel.

The band almost gives us a vibe that GHOST had provided in the past where the anonymous nature of the artist forces you to connect with the music and lyrical composition of the artist versus developing a direct association with the appearance of the band. This is probably one of my favorite aspects of this artist. I feel not many musicians/groups chose to go this route and the pure artform of what they are creating gets lost.

Now, lets get down to the nitty gritty, the opinion. I 100% caved into the Tiktok hype and started poking around and listening to more of this band, to my present surprise, this band provided a substantial amount of differences than what you’d typically get from a “new kid on the block’. Vessel’s vocals range from anything in the realm of the bluesy and dark where you are getting Amy Winehouse vibes all the way to vocals reminiscent of Sam Smith with the level of beauty and grace that would not be expected from a rock band.

A couple songs I HIGHLY recommend to listen to from this artist that aren’t quite part of the mainstream Tiktok fandom that Sleep Token has created would be “The Love You Want”, “Hypnosis” and “Alkaline”. I wish there was a way for me to loop this band into a genre but its absolutely impossible to do so. Below I am going to dig a bit deeper into each one of these tracks to explain why.

The Love You Want

The Love You want was my first encounter with the band outside of Tiktok. A song that you probably could put on a pop station and get away with it with how the current depth of pop/alternative scene is. The song has a beautiful start with very unusual elements from the electronic moments and leads into a very beautiful piano bit that continues through out the song. But what really hits me is the lyrics, you would not expect this at all from a rock band. The lyrics are absolutely breath taking and really will strike an emotional response to anyone who’s experienced trauma in losing love.

Hypnosis

Now, Hypnosis… what can I say about Hypnosis. The song sounds exactly as the name depicts which is the most rare thing you can experience within music. This is where you get the Amy Winehouse-esque vocals with that extra added element of dark, gothic and moody rock elements. As you go through the track you get drawn into the overall vibe of how truly entrancing it is. This probably is my absolute favorite track from Sleep Token.

Alkaline

This is only the second time in my 12+ year career in music that I am going to say that a song is sexy. But damn, if this song isn’t probably the hottest — and I definitely mean this on the feeling spectrum — track I have heard. The bass guitar runs and the sultry vocals just make this an absolute “chefs kiss”


To wrap things up, this is just a home run for a new artist finally hitting the mainstream. I am super excited to continue exploring this group’s dynamic and future releases.