Sleep Letters – Holding Cell 7″

Hailing from Vancouver, SLEEP LETTERS are an electronic duo consisting of synth-cinema composer BARTEL and drummer Geoff. This looks like their debut 7″, coming in an edition of 300 on white vinyl from Non-Participant Records.

There’s so much going on in a track like “Holding Cell,” which is truly a hybrid between traditional instrumentation and swift electronics. The only real instrument involved is a drum set which drives both songs from the bottom up. It’s a drawn out track, challenged by perpetually sludgy electronics that swirl and pop and rarely ever slow their pace. This keeps the unsettling notions afloat throughout the duration of the track, but the B-side “Around Us” seems to take on a slightly different structure. Either way still, both songs have a sci-fi, Blade Runner-esque sound going for them, which probably stems from all the percolating electronics that refuse to settle down. “Around Us” probably speaks to that description a little more accurately, which fluctuates between those troubling sci-fi tones and a heavenly, gospel-like sanctuary that reveals itself in the midst of the track. This ends abruptly due to a bruising drum roll, which leads the song treading carefully through an atmospheric finale, sealing us in a bubble of tranquility as the other elements from the song work their way back into the picture.

Give these songs enough time to sink in and you will soon enough be on board with Sleep Letters – if you ever listened to the Faint, they seem to share some basic similarities. We can’t be too sure at this very moment, but if these two tracks are any indication, this duo has plenty more up their sleeve for the future. Check out both sides of the 7″ right below and head on over to their Bandcamp page to snag a 7″!

Holding Cell –

Around Us –

Genre/ Tags: Electronic, Indie Rock, Ambient
Holding Cell 7″: Tracklist:
1.) Holding Cell
2.) Around Us

BUY the 7″ directly from the band on Bandcamp – limited to 300, white vinyl !
Sleep Numbers on Bandcamp