Classic Rock

Sleep

London Shepherd’s Bush Empire

- Dave Everley

Psychonaut­ical grooves from the stonerrock overlords.

They’re handing out ear buds at the bar, such are the anticipate­d levels of volume tonight.

But these foam plugs work equally well stuck up your nose to prevent a contact high from the dope smoke drifting up from the floor.

Sleep may or may not have been the first stoner-rock band, but they’re easily the greatest.

The reunited San Jose trio’s legend is built on their hymnals to altered consciousn­ess, slo-mo eruptions with the weight and agility of tectonic plates.

The Empire was temporaril­y closed a couple of years ago due to fears over structural safety. Here, the monolithic power of Marijuanau­t’s Theme and Holy Mountain alone should give the local health and safety representa­tives the jitters once more.

There’s nothing in the way of banter from bassist/ vocalist Al Cisneros, thankfully. But guitarist Matt

Pike – stripped to the waist and looking like a side of well-fed beef covered in cave-painting tattoos – provides a weirdly charismati­c focal point, a blur of hair, sweat, gut and ink.

They finish with their two most enduring songs, alternativ­e universe hit single Dragonaut and a truncated version of the epic Dopesmoker, the sludge-metal Stairway To Heaven. Then, without fuss, they’re gone, the ring of noise in our ears, the stench of weed in our nostrils. As it was, as it should be.

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