Review Summary: “I just… question Christianity. We’re growing up to be men, and now we’re looking at the real world and then looking at what we’re taught… I don’t even know what I’m feeling day in and day out when it comes to what I think about God.”
It seems like these days just about everyone hates Christian music. Secular listeners of course despise the cliché and narrow-minded lyricism. It’s perfectly understandable; who wouldn’t be annoyed when the entire subject matter of an artist’s music assumed an opinion not shared by the listener to be as absolute as heliocentricism? But ironically, Christian listeners and fans don’t really like it either. The “Christian scene” attempts to deny its own existence in numerous interviews and bios, but in doing so it perpetuates its identity as an annoying, undesired designation. What band welcomes the question, “are you Christian?” It inevitably leads to either a response like “well we’re Christians in a band, and we have some spiritual lyrics, but we’re definitely not a Christian band.” Or, “Yes we are a Christian band, but we try to appeal to non-Christian listeners.” Both responses really mean, “Oh no, not this crap again.” But despite the angst surrounding the ever-hated label, practically no one tries to break out of it. “Christian music” still brings to mind either family-friendly worship-pop or successful supergroups like Underoath or Anberlin that spend more time trying to excuse their faith than articulate it. Shame. If more bands approached music like As Cities Burn the world would be a better place.
Come Now Sleep is the sound of an honest man, a man struggling with faith, a man that has grown up and is no longer content with having faith like a child. From start to finish, Cody Bonnette cries, screams, and whispers his doubts and his faith. Come Now Sleep is a journey examining the challenges of Christianity. Every track is jam packed with pain, frustration, and questions, from Empire’s self-condemnation,
“I was a middle son / between two wayward ones / I was more deserving of my parents love / I had an angel’s smile / hiding a vultures bite / I had no use for your redeeming blood / Aren't I glory, glorious?” to Contact’s opening lines,
“hearts aren't really our guides / we are truly alone / cause God ain't up in the sky / holding together our bones” to Our World Is Grey’s commentary,
“he's shooting god up his arm through a needle / and she's putting cuts on her legs to bleed out the devil / ‘surely you will not die, eat and you shall be like God.’ / what have we done?” More passionate frontmen are hard to come by. In addition, much of the lyrical content of Come Now Sleep is inspired by the suicide of Timothy Jordan II, keyboardist for the All-American Rejects and Jonezetta and a close friend of the band. The album is dedicated to him, as is the closing track Timothy. Bonnette said on this, “I think our view of Heaven, Hell, God and the afterlife are all pretty hard to comprehend until we have someone we know that’s passed away.” Cody Bonnette is a man unhinged with confusion and anxiety and Come Now Sleep is the backdrop for his mad rants and rage.
The heavily distorted backdrop of guitars adds to the chaos. The flow of the album seamlessly transitions from soft and mellow to explosive and frantic both within tracks (Contact, Clouds) and from track to track. Perfect production greatly adds to the dark, frenetic atmosphere, with shimmering guitar effects and fading techniques. They even have the audacity to use an array of spoken word samples on Clouds, in which various people speak their opinions of who God is. The full band erupts in a chorus
“Is your love really love? / is my love really love? / I think our love isn't love / unless it's love to the end. / Is your god really God? / is my god really God? / I think our god isn't God / if he fits inside our heads” providing an absolutely chilling climax midway through the album. Come Now Sleep trades off between urgency and resignation creating an unrivaled emotional roller coaster.
Come Now Sleep is one of those albums. Some may not personally connect with its themes, but those that do will hail it as monumental achievement. The conservative Christian listener could find it blasphemous, the inquisitive Christian life changing, and the unreligious interesting. But if you can get through it without feeling something then you quite simply weren’t paying attention. Perhaps one of the most landmark albums in the last decade of “Christian music” and an essential listen if you grew up in a Christian home.
“Take me back to where I was before I was born / it's light, sweet, and dreamless sleep / it sounds like heaven to me.“
