Palladium, Cologne, Germany 11th December 2023
Sleep Token - “German Headline Rituals Tour” - Special Guests: Health
“Third time is a charm”, or so they say. It seems the appetite of the fans for live performances from SLEEP TOKEN in Germany is pretty insatiable, as the third show within 12 months sold out in a heartbeat. The genre-defying superstars of Alternative Metal, Post-Rock, Progressive Metal, Indie Rock as well as Ambient, with traces of Tech Metal, Djent, Pop, and R&B around the mysteriously masked singer Vessel have definitely mastered the secret sauce of attracting their young, and predominantly female audience. This could very well be observed in front of the Palladium, as a long line of people matching that description stretching out for hundreds of meters waited excitedly to be let into the venue.
Health
The task of opening up the evening fell on HEALTH, a trio from Los Angeles. Their ‘New Wave’ inspired Industrial Rock proved to be the perfect fit for the main act of the evening. So far, HEALTH have released seven albums, with the latest being called ‘Rat Wars’. https://www.youwillloveeachother.com
Music & Performance
A little earlier than announced at 7:50 pm the lights went low and the totally happy Japanese pop song ‘Zankoku na Tenhi no Thesis’ from Yoko Takahashi started playing over the speakers. This faded into the first notes of the opening song ‘IDENTITY’, for which the band boldly animated the audience to clap. Even though there was next to none interaction with the audience, HEALTH managed to wow the audience with audiovisual precision. Even though the vocals of singer Jake Duzsik are more tranquil, the sampling and the breakdowns managed to squeeze the air out of the lungs of the people in front of the stage. Coupled with a solid light show with laser and stroboscope effects, this set the scene for a very entertaining warm-up performance, so kudos to SLEEP TOKEN for not insisting on dialling down the sound and light system.
Rating
Music: 8
Performance:7
Sound: 8
Light: 8
Total: 8 / 10
Sleep Token
The quartet from London with the numbered musicians around singer Vessel has witnessed a meteoric rise since their humble beginning back in 2016. SLEEP TOKEN has released their third album ‘Take Me Back To Eden’ in May 2023, and this album contains the Uber hit ‘The Summoning’, racking up over 80 million streams on Spotify alone, further fuelling the band’s rise to stardom via various social media platforms. http://www.sleep-token.com
Music & Performance
This was an entrance to behold: After a few minutes in total darkness, SLEEP TOKEN’s band logo sprang to life with a bright red illumination, coupled with a mechanic waking sound, which morphed into the first notes of the band’s opener ‘Chokehold’. Frenetic cheering started as singer Vessel in his Star Wars-inspired iconic monk-like costume, and immediately showcased his enormous vocal range. Things picked up steam when guitar player IV joined his mates on stage, sporting an impressive 8-string guitar, and dropping the heavy riffs of the song. With III still being absent from the show due to a family incident, the recorded base backing tracks blended in perfectly with the rest of the samples. The stage action focused largely on Vessel, who commanded the attention of the crowd with his charismatic moves and stage presence.
The rest of the band members made fun of each other by putting weird gimmicks such as bunny ears or unicorn crowns on top of their heads during the performance. In terms of visual entertainment, the light show was really exceptional. Various LED bars, spotlights, and lasers made sure that sure, that besides the acoustic force, the visual stimulation of senses added to the overwhelmingly impressive concert experience. The genre-defying musical art performance of SLEEP TOKEN can only be described as a wild ride. From neck-breaking circle pit action during ‘Granite’ to the melodious, tear-jerkingly emotional ‘Ascensionism’, the band managed to take the audience with them through the complete emotional spectrum, which is probably the root cause for the band’s massive success and their cult-like following.
All good things had to come to an end after 90 minutes of playtime after ‘Take Me Back to Eden’. The audience – through frantic screaming and clapping – managed to extract one more song from the band - - the memorable ‘The Offering’ - as an encore. After the final chords, II and IV jokingly took off their masks, only to reveal that they had another mask underneath, and threw them into the crowd. And as the lights went on, WHITNEY HOUSTON’s ‘I Wanna Dance With Somebody’ started playing from the speakers, and the spent but happy audience was sent off into the night.
Setlist
01. Chokehold
02. Hypnosis
03. Vore
04. Interlude I
05. Dark Signs
06. Like That
07. Aqua Regia
08. Interlude II
09. Rain
10. The Summoning (drum solo during the bridge)
11. Granite
12. The Love You Want
13. Interlude III
14. Atlantic
15. Nazareth
16. Alkaline
17. Ascensionism
18. Higher
19. Interlude IV
20. Take Me Back to Eden
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21. The Offering
Rating
Music: 8
Performance: 9
Sound: 8
Light: 9
Total: 8.5 / 10
All Pictures by Adamross Williams @adamrosssi
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