The Sleeping
This group from the eastern part of the United States offers the listener something that might best be described as a hybrid, a mix or a combination. It’s hard to put a finger on just what this really is, but The Sleeping is a group of fine musicians who are not nearly as anti-melodic as some of the screamo/growl groups such as A Life Once Lost and Demallion. Post-hardcore is one way to describe it.
What makes The Sleeping’s presentation somewhat different is the mix of excellent vocals from Douglas Robinson (clarity and range) with the angry growl from the "peanut gallery" of supporting vocals. The drumming of Joseph Zizzo is energetic, as music in this style requires. But he goes beyond this with some accomplished rhythm changes and movement that are pleasing.
Cameron Keym is the guitar/keyboard man for The Sleeping and his guitar work stands out well on "Believe What We Tell You." "Heart Beatz" ( Questions and Answers, Victory Records ) has a great structure, with excellent single-note licks and guitar rhythm. For those who haven’t heard this group, "Heart Beatz" is a good song to start the experience with. The growling lines and drive of a couple of the band’s tunes like "Believe What We Tell You" best exemplify Salvatore Mignano’s bass work.
Some of the studied rhythm/beat changes used by The Sleeping are signatures of many young metal bands working today, but there is something else going on here. As shown with "King of Hearts" ( Questions and Answers, Victory Records ), these young fellows are songwriters too.
Current tour stops included Milwaukee, Chicago and Detroit, and the river community of Covington, Kentucky (across the Ohio from Cincinnati). The Sleeping will also be in Buffalo, Cleveland, Pittsburgh and New York, among other locations.
Tags: independent music, indie, the sleeping, indie music, music
I got a really bad impression of these guys at first. When they just had that one guitar going in the beginning of “Better than Anything Else,” I coulda swarn that was there music style. Then they bursted out, and I’m pretty sure my woofer woke up the guys downstairs ;3 Means they are great.
This band is, indeed, really powerful, especially, as jgrant has pointed out, the guitars “burst” out in a blaze of edgy rock. Not my “thang,” really, but for people who like their rock with lots of angry growls and nice backbeats, The Sleeping is a good band that deserves a great deal of attention.
I have a friend who really adores The Sleeping, but I haven’t heard anything from them myself. My friend said that the songwriting is really powerful, and like Fardreamer mentioned, the are pretty edgy. I might have to give these guys a look.
When listening to bands from the east part of the U.S. I think that you have a heavy side then most artists from the west. I think that starting soft and coming out is a good character in a song. It makes them seem one way at first and then totally blows you away.
I’m not sure that’s necessarily true. I’ve listened to bands from many regions of the U.S., and unless they are doing obvious stuff like Southern Rock, I haven’t noticed this East Coast heaviness that you refer to, attagirl.
Musically, the “false start” to songs isn’t unique to rock, much less to indie rock. Some famous classical music pieces start one way and then surprise listeners by tempo/timbre/orchestration changes, and lots of pop songs (”Scenes from an Italian Restaurant”) pull off the same trick.
I would have to agree with Fardreamer here. Bands all over the United States exhibit the heaviness that was referred to. I don’t really notice anything extra with the eastern US bands. I agree that it is a nice touch, but not really anything that is specific to those bands.
I think what sets these guys apart is the voice on the lead singer. I’ll admit I have never heard of them until I checked them out on Myspace, but I am glad I did. Not only are the vocals good, but check out those guitar riffs. This kind of band is usually a bit too heavy for my taste, but they pull it off well by the way they switch things up.
I am a visual person and when I saw The Sleeping display picture I was not to sure if they were going to be my taste. I read others comments concerning their music and thought I would give them a listen from their Myspace. The best way to explain my thoughts is, “They Rock!” WOW! I am so glad I took the time to listen and not just judge based on their cover.
It is rather an unusual name for a band, it sound like they are not active. They may look lame, but when you hear them play. It will make you think that you are in heaven. These guys are great!
I think that it’s not fair to judge the book by its cover.
I like their edgy sound. I hadn’t noticed that there were great regional differences between different parts of the US, as another commentor mentioned, but I’ll be paying attention to that now.
I like hard rocky sounds, and this is a nice break from the whiny vocals that I’ve been hearing far too much of lately.
how did we get compared to in this article..i havent heard the band yet but i’m sure they are good..weather it was a put down or a good review for us in this article along with a life once lost and the sleeping…thank you..haha
http://www.myspace.com/demallionmetal
I suppose that if a Southern-based band sang about themes that are about their region or infused their music with genres associated with the South, there’d probably be some regional identity, or, to be fair, if a Northern-based band or a California band did the same thing. (The Beach Boys come very easily to mind here.)
Other than that, though, modern rock, indie or not, seems to be multi-regional to my ears.
I agree to a certain extent Fardreamer, but when I hear bands like “Three Doors Down” (modern rock) I can distinctly tell that these are southern boys. And for some reason I can always pick up on the bands from the Seattle area. It used to be a bit easier as there are so many bands trying to emulate that Seattle “grunge” sound, but more often than not I can.
I have just visited their site. I found it unusual because this is the only Indie band site that is selling stuffs online. There are selling T-shirts with logo, sweatshirt, and even accessories. I think that it’s better, if you check out the site itself. The site’s URL is
http://www.merchdirect.net/TheSleeping
This is best for fans of the band. You better hurry, if you don’t want run out of stocks.
I don’t see that as a problem postman, isn’t just being progressive and forward thinking, every band struggles at first and th emore revenue streams you can open up the better as foar as i am concerned
Well…I can’t really tell where they come from through their voices. I just figure everyone has a different sound. I’m sure there’s someone from New York who might sound like one of these guys here. Either ways though, I’m not really into the screamo groups, though at least they actually have understandable lyrics and don’t scream the entire time.
I am usually totally against the scream-o bands too Silver, but these guys aren’t bad. I can actually get through their songs without getting a headache and wanting to skip through it. Again though, the guitar riffs and instrumentals are wonderful.
This is a great band!!!!!!!!!!
I’m so NOT into the scream-o style of rock that it’s a wonder that I listen to rock at all. (Maybe it’s because I heard too many live bands at parties during my college days that were all about simply being LOUD rather than about being, well, musically interesting.)
However, I’m always willing to try something new every once in a blue moon.
There are so many different kinds of rock. Scream-o just happens to be one genre out of thousands of rock genres that evolved from the hard core punk scene back in the 90’s. It’s not really fair to lump all rock music into this genre.
I wasn’t lumping all of rock into one genre. The Beatles, for instance, were rock and though for their era they may have been more vocal and energetic, they weren’t scream-o. I was merely commenting that it’s a wonder that one particular sub-genre of music nearly made me not like any other rock styles.
Yes, that definitely is a wonder ! How could you let one particular sub-genre almost sway you away from an entire genre of fantastic music ?
Well, it’s a situation pretty much like…um…someone not liking classical music at all because he/she doesn’t like Wagner’s operas. Pretty much something along those lines.
I would say that that particular person is either pretty inexperienced in that genre by basing its entirety on one certain person, or they are just being plain silly. Either way, there are just so many different kinds of sounds and music in EVERY genre. I think it’s pretty odd to not want to listen to an entire genre based on one band or one sub genre, but to each his/her own.
I’ve never heard of this band before now. I’m glad that I took the time to check out their myspace page. The vocals are great. It was a little unexpected though. With a name like The Sleeping, I have to admit I had my reservations about liking them at all. But they are not sleeping, and there is no way you can sleep through their songs.