Sleepless — Winds Blow Higher

One of the latest addition to The End Records' stable; A band that makes me wish I was insomniac. "What is so special about this band?" will you ask. They are good. Very good!

This is their first album and a more than promising debut! Sometimes the overall ambience reminds me of Mental Home's "Winter Art" (on the album "Black Art" for those not yet initiated to the joys of that Russian band) and if I had to describe then in a very minimalistic way, I'd say that they are a jazzy progressive/psychedelic goth/metal/ambient band (if that's a minimalistic description, imagine what the band sounds like!).

Upon my first listen, what I noticed the most was the bass: it adds a 3rd dimension to the band's sound and the playing is very intricate yet tasteful, Maor Applebaum (who also sings, play guitar, etc) is obviously a talented fellow and flexible musician.

There are two main singers on the album; the male vocalist mostly whispers - sometimes in a slightly gruff way - and the female vocalist's delivery reminds me of many darkwave bands (the good ones anyway); this duo concept with interaction between male/female (I'm talking about vocals here; you perverts!) is nothing new, but it's particularly well done in this case and that's what matters.

I detected some of the band's influences and, although I might be wrong, here's what I was reminded of: in "Solitude" at around 40 seconds into the song it starts to sound like Cynic! I was rather surprised at first but the hyperactive bass, jazzy drums and lead guitar lines really do sound like them. Of course it doesn't last for very long and I'm not saying that the whole album is a "Focus" sound-alike, it's just a nice little bonus! I also found that the bombastic keyboards, repetitive (in a hypnotic way) drum beat and simple guitar lines in "Winds Blow Higher" reminded me of Summoning. I won't enumerate all the influences of the bands (I probably couldn't), but I think that it's absolutely great that a band can be diverse enough to alternate from a gothic-darkwave aesthetic to a jazz breakdown (like at the end of "Lying in Wait"), then to Summoning-like majesty and then to the impressive prog-jazz-metal of Cynic! And I didn't even talk about the saxophone on "Solitude" and "Strings"...

The End Records (the band's label) was at first known, a few years ago, for its high quality rooster of bands; Agalloch, Sculptured, Mental Home, Nokturnal Morktum... Then they grew immensely as a distribution company with many hard to get and sought after albums in stock, and now it seems they are trying to reconquer their original "breeding ground for good bands" throne by signing bands like Sleepless and Green Carnation. I dedicate a few of those kudos to them!

Update: Well dear friends, it seems that this album really is "full of surprises". Andreas K. from The End Records contacted me and I was informed that there is NO FEMALE VOCALS on this album - I thought it was weird that there was none listed in the booklet but I always assumed it was an omission. I will leave the review as I first wrote it because it was an honest mistake and I was even sure that Andreas was joking when he told me, so it's probable that others will be mistaken as I was. Even now, when I listen to it, I hear a feminine voice in the first song and all over the rest of the disc! I have even asked others about it and it seems that the general reaction when I tell them is "OH MY GOD! THAT'S NOT A CHICK?!". Well, it's obvious that one of the guy in Sleepless can sing with an effeminate tone (it's not just high pitched, it's really a woman tone of voice) and it sure is a great quality for a singer! It sounds very good and it makes the album even more surprising & unique...