Ethereal Metal

Ryan Murray | Co-Owner | Chief Editor |Contributor | Photographer

r.m.music84@gmail.com

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Sleep Token, the mysterious British collective that has captivated the metal world with their emotional intensity and sonic shapeshifting, has just dropped their third single, “Damocles,” and it’s a haunting, thunderous milestone. Arriving alongside their move to RCA Records, this latest release deepens the intrigue leading up to their upcoming album Even In Arcadia, due out May 9. For a band that thrives on duality—ethereal beauty and crushing heaviness, anonymity and visibility—“Damocles” is the perfect chapter in their evolving mythology.

“Damocles” doesn’t just start—it breathes. It exhales. Vessel’s voice enters like a ghost at the edge of a dream, hovering over a delicate swell of keys that sound like they’ve been pulled from the deepest well of sorrow. His vocals are vulnerable, intimate, nearly whispered—until they erupt. Guitars rumble in beneath him, joined by explosive drums and surging bass, each chorus hitting harder than the last. The lyrics are devastating in their simplicity and honesty:

“When the river runs dry and the curtain is called, how will I know if I can’t see the bottom? Come up for air and choke on it all, no one else knows that I’ve got a problem.”

The track captures the claustrophobia of self-doubt and emotional isolation, but it does so with grandeur—this is existential dread set to a stadium-sized soundtrack. Each chorus returns like a tidal wave, bigger, darker, more engulfing. It’s a song that climbs and crashes, leaving listeners breathless by the final note.

This powerful release is the band’s third major single since signing to RCA Records in February 2024, a move that raised eyebrows but ultimately made perfect sense. After dominating 2023 with their critically acclaimed third album Take Me Back to Eden, released via Spinefarm Records, Sleep Token had proven they were more than a niche act. They were an unstoppable force. As Revolver put it, “Sleep Token’s signing to a major label like RCA makes sense. After their arena-conquering 2023, Vessel and Co. are genuinely one of the biggest metal acts in the world right now.”

That meteoric rise brings us to Even In Arcadia, the band’s fourth studio album and their first under the RCA banner. Slated for release on May 9, the album promises to plunge even deeper into the band’s sonic multiverse—where heavy riffs crash against trip-hop textures, and jazz solos surface unexpectedly amid growled vocals. As Kerrang! writes, the album “continues the unfolding journey, where Sleep Token further intertwines the boundaries of sound and emotion, dissolving into something otherworldly.” If Damocles is any indication, we’re in for a record that burns down every genre label in its path.

Before “Damocles,” the band teased their new era with two genre-blurring singles: “Emergence” and “Caramel.”

“Emergence,” released on March 13, was a slow-burning epic that fused orchestral keys and aching vocals with a swelling electronic trip-hop vibe, before lurching into a full-on metal assault. It closed with an unexpected jazz-infused outro, including a saxophone solo that left listeners stunned. NME praised it as “a sprawling and genre-defying song,” while Revolver called it “stunning.”

“Caramel,” on the other hand, was a curveball few saw coming. It opened with lullaby-like synths, only to swerve into a reggaeton beat, pulling fans into a groove-heavy haze. Then came the whiplash. The drums exploded into a syncopated prog-metal attack beneath the lyric:

“Every time they try to shout my real name just to get a rise from me. Acting like I’m never stressed out by the hearsay. I guess that’s what I get for trying to hide in the limelight.”

Moments later, a full-scale metal breakdown with blast beats and brutal growls ripped through the haze. And just like that, the song returned to its hypnotic opening, leaving listeners dazed and desperate to hit replay.

While Sleep Token’s music has always walked the line between divine revelation and emotional exorcism, their mystique has remained one of their most powerful tools. Frontman Vessel and the rest of the group continue to perform in anonymity, masked and cloaked in shadow. But that illusion was recently threatened. In early 2024, a fan allegedly leaked personal information about a member of the band. The fallout was immediate: Sleep Token wiped their social media presence, and a community built on mystery and reverence found itself forced to reckon with the darker side of fandom. Outlets like Louder and Metal Hammer reported on the doxxing incident, which prompted widespread conversations about privacy, ethics, and entitlement in online music spaces. The band’s silence only deepened the impact—proving that even in chaos, Sleep Token controls their own narrative.

And that narrative is charging full force toward Even In Arcadia. The album, named after the Latin phrase et in Arcadia ego—a reminder of death’s presence even in paradise—suggests a thematic confrontation with impermanence, illusion, and identity. If “Damocles” is any indication, this will be Sleep Token’s most raw and human record yet.

Supporting the album is the Even In Arcadia Tour, a sprawling North American run that includes a landmark stop at Brooklyn’s Barclays Center on September 22. From underground cult heroes to arena-filling headliners, Sleep Token has undergone one of the most staggering ascents in modern heavy music.

With “Damocles,” they’ve delivered a song that aches, rages, and soars. It’s a track that captures everything that makes Sleep Token what they are: vulnerable yet untouchable, melodic yet punishing, cryptic yet deeply personal. And with Even In Arcadia just around the corner, one thing is clear—Sleep Token isn’t just redefining what metal can sound like. They’re redefining what it means to feel it.