Sleep Stage’s “Warning: Toxic” drags you through the scorched emotional wreckage you probably know all too well. Right off the bat with “Sick of Love Songs,” you’re hit with shredded guitar fuzz and driving drums. The reverbed vocals are sarcastic, like someone barely holding it together. And when the bridge rolls in, there’s this muffled tension that lifts suddenly as the singer’s voice breaks loose and screams through a wall of distortion, punching right into your gut.
Then there’s “Love At First Bite,” a fever dream of loathing where the singer sings like he is numbed and high and drunk over buzzing, gritty, churning guitar riffs and thumping beats playing a menacing tune that gets you intoxicated in the rhythm, like a jilted lover is left high and dry on the first bite of love.
With over 1.1k plays on Spotify, “Death in Those Arms” creeps in when you’re already neck-deep in the sludge of doomed attachment. The frustration practically leaks out of the singer’s voice in the verses, but the chorus is where the rage boils over. His voice gnashes and snarls over thick guitars and pounding drums, like he’s clawing his way out of his own head. It’s heavy, haunting, and weirdly addictive, just like a relationship you know is killing you, but still can’t walk away from.
With Warning: Toxic, Sleep Stage isn’t trying to save you. But who needs saving when you got the thrill of danger, right? So check it out at your own risk on Spotify.
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Review by: Naomi Joan