Review: Sleep Token - Emergence (New Single)

My body has been ready for new Sleep Token since “Take Me Back To Eden” was released in 2023 (My #2 AOTY only under A7X which is to be expected) so as we approached midday today (13/03/25), I was excited with a hint of worry for the release of the first track from their upcoming album “Even In Arcadia” but…this isn’t it.

Image credit: Sleep Token

This song sadly falls under the low category of what feels like many different ideas for many different songs then just mushed together to form one messy track. The intro piques interest but then falls into a slow build to what ends up being quite an annoying repeated line of “arms around me”.

The band are known for having unexpected rapping parts, and when they work they’re great, but this sounds so off note and doesn’t have the back and forth rhythm which often makes their rapping parts so unique and easy to go along the lyrics with. The guitar parts get heavier down the line but it doesn’t do much to save the song. Back to the repeated part mentioned above and to close an out-of-nowhere saxophone solo. I’m unsure what thought process brought that to the table but it just felt so out of place.

I know the average Sleep Token fan that reads this will not be happy with this review, but trust me when I say I want to love this, I really do! Sleep Token are even in my top 3 bands right now but I am 6 listens in, and it actually gets worse each time. Knowing myself, I’ll force myself to listen to it 50 times over the weekend and I’ll love it by Monday but those are my first thoughts. “Even In Arcadia” comes out on the 9th of May, I’m still very excited about it.

Review by Keiran