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To start with was the thought, and the thought was God. Or a god, not less than. Sleep Token’s wealthy mythology has offered a fertile breeding floor for fascination and hypothesis as followers have interaction with the lore of Sleep and provide their very own interpretations and understandings to show every new launch right into a steel choose-your-own-adventure.
And now they’re right here, seven years on from their first headline gig, headlining the largest rock and steel competition within the UK, cementing themselves because the fastest-rising band in steel since Linkin Park. The ocean of Sleep Token merch is to be anticipated by this level, as are particular little mysteries just like the Sleep Token-branded bar code that popped up across the web site early on right this moment (it was a contest, mainly).
All constructing as much as this. And what a construct up it’s. The sounds of wind howling as a black curtain is raised agonisingly slowly, the notes of Look To Windward giving option to a crushing riff and howls of ecstasy because the band seem atop an ornate stage. It’s nothing in comparison with the shrieks when Vessel strides out of a stone doorway, signalling the beginning of the set correct (after a minor snafu with half the stage curtain).
Pink petals fall like snow from overhead and Sleep Token have formally arrived at Obtain, incomes huge singalongs early on. However for all the main focus typically positioned on Vessel’s melodic intonations, it’s his howls that really feel most astounding because the band lead a roaring, visceral Vore. Vessel isn’t any mere static figurehead, both. Be it stalking throughout the stage as he raps or bursting right into a full dance for Emergence, which ends in an epic sax solo carried out atop a raised platform, the mysterious vocalist exudes charisma even with out saying something, among the set’s most transferring components occurring when Vessel merely steps again to play piano.
A stunning, atmospheric encore of Thread The Needle highlights an emotional candor and intimacy that has at all times prevailed of their music, whilst lights bathe the stage in technicolour hues and all the things from descending cages to waterfalls betrays the sheer scope of the place the band function now. The primary music they ever launched, it additionally completely tees up the hovering Take Me Again To Eden. By no matter metric you might choose Sleep Token as a headliner, they meet it. The devoted passionately sing alongside to only about each music, however the wider congregation can nonetheless take part with the likes of Alkaline, Caramel and The Summoning, the latter’s viral bass breakdown precipitated by an enormous drum solo.
Set atop a set design worthy of early 80s Iron Maiden and with a blinding lightshow and a backing choir to intensify the melodies, there’s no skimping on manufacturing; all the things about their Donington headline debut feeling monumental. Sleep Token’s rise to headlining Obtain has been nicely documented, however isn’t any much less astounding. From taking part in the Dogtooth tent in 2018, to headlining a tent on the Obtain Pilot in 2021, the step up as headliner feels genuinely-earned.
Even in opposition to Inexperienced Day, whose Donington debut feels lengthy overdue and Korn, who’ve their very own illustrious previous on the competition, Sleep Token headlining Obtain Competition 2025 feels actually momentous, a legendary occasion within the making. And their story continues to be not completed. Primary album, offered out excursions, they’re the steel sensation of the last decade, if not century, and this set attracts a line within the sand for doubters. Prefer it or not, they’re prime of the world proper now.
Sleep Token Obtain 2025 setlist
Look to Windward
The Providing
Vore
Emergence
Alkaline
Hypnosis
Rain
Caramel
The Summoning
Granite
The Love You Need
Larger
Damocles
Thread the Needle
Take Me Again to Eden
