By Nicholas Kobe, Staff Writer

[Century Media; 2025]

Rating: 5/10

Key Tracks:“The Siege,” “Gravity,” “Hosting the Shadow” 

Italian metal band Lacuna Coil returns with their first album in five years, Sleepless Empire — a record that isn’t messing with what has made Lacuna Coil successful in the past. However, most of these new songs still fail to reach the bar set by the band’s influences and contemporaries 

Lacuna Coil is a quintessentially “European” sounding band. They’re stradling directly between some of the continent’s most dominant subgenres: namely, symphonic bands (Within Temptation, Epica, Nightwish) and melodic death metal (Arch Enemy, Amon Amarth, In Flames). However, this is a kind of “jack of all trades, master of none” situation.

Vocally, Lacuna Coil succeeds with flying colors. The dual screaming of Andrea Ferro and singing of Cristina Scabbia allow Lacuna Coil to switch between beautiful and brutal on a dime, or combine the two. This vocal flexibility is even more apparent as they adapt to their two vastly different guests, Randy Blythe of Lamb of God and Ashley Costello of New Year’s Day. However, the instrumental work never rises to meet the occasion. The guitar playing is very straightforward and by the numbers, and while bands like this will have earwormy keyboard or guitar riffs or memorable solos to offset any lackluster rhythm guitar, that’s just not up to snuff here. 

There are, of course, plenty of standout moments. The aforementioned track with Randy Blythe “Hosting the Shadow” is the bands best foray into their heavier side. “Gravity” and “Oxygen” are the album’s most accessible cuts, and get the closest to the earworm status without feeling completely out of line. 

Read more: Album Review: Jinjer – Duél

The Apple Music page for Sleepless Empire features a long interview with Ferro where he elaborates on the meaning of each of the tracks on the record. Reading the interview, you can clearly see how there’s a few different directions Lacuna Coil is being pulled in lyrically, primarily the overwhelming nature of social media and isolation. This vision isn’t super clear upon first listen, and while re-reading the lyrics allowed me to understand the themes of the album better, I wasn’t any more impressed. Lacuna Coil’s war-like imagery used to convey being overwhelmed by society in “The Siege,” or the panic and claustrophobia throughout “In The Meantime” are some of the most notable, or I guess, least notable examples of very unoriginal lyrics, especially in this genre.

That’s not to say there’s nothing worthwhile here. “The Scarecrow” is probably the best track on the album lyrically — not only taking the “I’m a scarecrow because I feel fake” angle, but also addressing the large shadow it casts, and using that as a metaphor for the sadness we all cast is really smart. 

A majority of my issues with Sleepless Empire weren’t surprising, as they reared their head last year when I did a brief dive into the band’s past work when preparing for a festival. While that’s bad news for me, to fans of Lacuna Coil, or anyone who generally will love any larger than life, kinda brutal, kinda accessible metal will be happy with this new album. While personally, this isn’t the tippy top shelf of European metal, I could see why fans might be drawn to this album, especially considering the lack of competition from Lacuna Coil’s most notable peers so far this year. Sleepless Empire is an easy record to listen to and enjoy (by metal standards), but for how quick and easy it goes down, it leaves very little lasting impact. 

Listen here: