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The Sonic Titans are BACK!

It is with great pleasure that I’m writting a review of (if not the most) influential band of the modern stoner/doom genre, I’m talking about mighty Sleep and their follow up to Dopesmoker/Jerusalem nearly 20 years later, so grab your bongs and learn your pentatonics because the review of “The Sciences” released on the perfect 4/20 of 2018, is about to start!

How is the sound ?

Sleep’s sound doesn’t need descriptions, it’s fucking Sleep! Slothfull, repetitive and neck bending riffs coming from the soul of the “Generalus Maximus of the Riff” Matt Pike paired with hypnotizing and weaving bass runs from the “Priest of the HolySmoke” Al Cisneros. This time the original duo gathered around the pounding drum work of Neurosis’s rhythm controller Jason Roeder, the rifflords released a 50 plus record under the banner of Third Man Records that has potential to be better than their Alma Mater “Holy Mountain”.

The album starts off with the homonymous “The Sciences” a 3-minute track regurgitating the weight of 20 years of frustration by past misfortunes of the band in form of feedback and pure distorted noise.

“Marijuanaut’s Theme” enters in the Colosseum of the pothead with a dizzying Sativa-induced riff that spawns the absence of gravity in your psyche, the top moments of this song? The drum work is phenomenal, and that bass work…speechless… listen closely afterwards 4:30 under Pike’s solo, there is the stomach of a colossal beast rumbling with eternal hunger.

The sludginess of “Sonic Titan” slumbers your senses for almost 5 minutes and buries them under one of the heaviest and disgusting riffs that Sleep has ever put out, while Cisneros leads the stoner caravan to ZZZZIIIIIIIIIIOOOOOOOON with his monochordic mantra-like vocal lines, that bends your auditive “weedality” vertically.

Why do I love this genre so much? Because you can write about the CBDeadcon (Mr.Geezer Butler) and icebergs melting to destroy cities under heavy riffage…headbanging with a smile…

This stellar effort finishes up with “The Botanist” and one thing is for sure…this song could last for another 20 years, the acoustic parts are awesome and the song overall is the perfect ending for the Great Wall of Riffage that is, The Sciences.

Great work guys!

The Innkeeper worships you!

Why is this album worth listening ?

First full album by Sleep in 20 years, I think that’s enough…

In what situation you should listen to this album ?

With really good headphones OR watch Sleep live very very veeeeeeeEeeeeEeeEEEeeRY stoned

Something particular to note ?

You can truly feel that the guys from Sleep have grown like a tree, their base is strong with deep roots on the early heavy metal of the 70’s especially Black Sabbath, though Al Cisneros branched out to create OM in a sonic quest of soul searching, and Matt Pike went to more classical, stoner-thrashy vibe of High On Fire, while Roeder brought the “story telling” drumwork of Neurosis to the table, they were able to combine all of this to create the definitive sound of Sleep, the almost jam vibe of Holy Mountain, the sludginess of Vol.1 and the opressive and thunderous compositions of Dopesmoker.