Metal Breakdown Daily is one page, every weekday: the episode on the player below and the three stories in print, so you can listen, read, or both. Today it leads with the Sleep Token statement, the first words from the band in a year, and they are not a comeback announcement. Sleep Token say they have “no affiliation with any outside musical project that invokes this name,” and while they never name the target, fans have one in mind: Arcus, a mystery project teased last month as being “from the co-creator of Sleep Token.”
Then a fight over the opening night of Slipknot’s 2027 stadium tour, where a London politician wants Marilyn Manson off the Wembley Stadium bill and the venue says it is talking to Live Nation. And System Of A Down have been projecting their logo across Los Angeles with a countdown running on their website, and the two-rose teaser has everyone saying the same two words: Rose Bowl.
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Scott Penfold opens today’s Metal Breakdown Daily with the Sleep Token statement and why a fence is not a door, then takes a side on who actually put Marilyn Manson on Slipknot’s Wembley bill, and reads the System Of A Down tea leaves in Pasadena. Download the free Loaded Radio App on Apple iOS and Google Play and stream the show now.
Sleep Token Break Their Silence, But Only To Protect The Name
Sleep Token posted a rare statement to their official channels over the weekend saying the band “has no affiliation with any outside musical project that invokes this name,” a message fans read as a direct response to Arcus, a project teased last month as being “from the co-creator of Sleep Token.”
The statement opens with “A word, for the sake of clarity,” which for a band that does not do interviews, press, or stage banter counts as a speech. It continues: “Such claims are not made with our blessing and are not endorsed by Sleep Token.” And it closes the way everything from this band closes, like a line from a liturgy: “What is ours is here, and here alone.”
Nobody is named. Fans filled the blank in fast. Arcus appeared last month with a YouTube teaser billed as being from Sleep Token’s co-creator. A widely shared post on Threads claims the person behind it is the band’s original manager, who departed around 2018 and has apparently said the mythology was his idea. He holds no writing credits on any Sleep Token release. As of Monday morning, the Arcus pages no longer mention Sleep Token at all.
The context is what makes this land. Sleep Token have not played a show since October 11, 2025, at Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles. Even In Arcadia debuted at number one on the Billboard 200 and topped charts around the world, and then 2026 went quiet: no tour, no single, no dates, no explanation. The future of the band has been an open question for a year.
That silence is exactly why somebody thought “from the co-creator of Sleep Token” would sell. When a band disappears, the vacuum gets filled. And read what the statement does not say. It does not say “we’re back.” It does not promise new music. It says what is ours is here. That is a fence, not a door. If you were hoping this was the start of a return, temper it. If you were wondering whether the band still cares enough to guard the thing they built, there is your answer.
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A London Politician Wants Marilyn Manson Off Slipknot’s Wembley Stadium Show
Anton Georgiou, leader of the Liberal Democrat group on Brent Council, the London borough that contains Wembley Stadium, has called on the venue to reconsider Marilyn Manson’s place on Slipknot’s July 3, 2027 Wembley show, the opening night of the band’s 2027 stadium tour.
For US readers: a councillor is roughly a city council member, and Brent is the local government for the part of London where Wembley sits. Georgiou’s statement said “Wembley Stadium needs to explain what consideration was given to them before this booking was confirmed,” adding that “It also needs to consider the message this sends to survivors of abuse.” He acknowledged that Manson denies wrongdoing and framed the booking against the UK government’s stated commitment to tackling violence against women and girls.
Brent Council itself was quick to say the decision is not theirs. The council said bookings at Wembley are a matter for the venue and the event organisers and that it has no direct control over commercial events there, while stressing that does not diminish its commitment on the issue. Wembley’s position is that support acts are chosen by the promoter and the headliner, and the stadium says it is “in talks with the promoter,” which is Live Nation.
Slipknot have not commented on the council development. When the bill was announced and the backlash started, Jim Root replied to a fan: “I concentrate on writing and being a guitarist, so forgive my ignorance about who we do shows with.” The Wembley bill also carries Lorna Shore and Hatebreed, and Manson is booked for four of the tour’s South American dates.
For the record: the allegations against Manson first went public more than five years ago. He has categorically denied any wrongdoing. Los Angeles County prosecutors declined to file criminal charges in January 2025. The civil lawsuit from Ashley Walters, alleging sexual assault and battery, has a trial date in November 2027, four months after the Wembley show.
Everybody in this chain is pointing at somebody else. The council points at the venue. The venue points at the promoter. The promoter has said nothing. And the band’s guitarist says he does not know who is on his own tour. Somebody made this decision. Nobody wants to own it. More on that in The Take.
System Of A Down Are Counting Down To Something In Los Angeles
System Of A Down’s logo appeared projected onto buildings and printed on street signage across Los Angeles over the weekend, alongside a countdown on systemofadown.com to a reveal the site calls “imminent,” and the promo’s two-rose visual has fans convinced the announcement is a Rose Bowl Stadium show in Pasadena.
The band has said nothing, which is normal. The teaser material uses a logo and font that fans matched to a specific venue, and the double rose does the rest: the Rose Bowl holds around 90,000 for concerts and is the biggest room in greater Los Angeles. Some fans also read the cursive version of the band’s name as a nod to Deftones, who toured stadiums with System last summer. None of it is confirmed. Treat it as a very educated guess.
What is confirmed: Toxicity turned twenty-five on September 4, and the band marked it with a free Beyond The Streets exhibition in Los Angeles that closed on Sunday. System have not played their hometown since February 2022, at what was then Banc of California Stadium. Their only California show since was Golden Gate Park in San Francisco in 2024. They play Sick New World in Fort Worth on Saturday, then open 2027 at Maracanã Stadium in Rio on January 15 before a run through Australia and New Zealand with Faith No More.
Four LA kids who made the biggest nu-metal record of all time, coming home to the biggest stadium in the city for its twenty-fifth birthday. If that is what this is, it is the right move, and maybe the only one left that still feels like an event for this band. They do not make new records; they have said so. So the question has become how big a greatest-hits set can get before it stops meaning anything. Ninety thousand people in Pasadena is a fair test.
The Take: Somebody Picked Manson For Wembley, And It Wasn’t The Council
The politician is wrong about who to blame and right about the question: Wembley does not choose support acts and a borough council has no say, but somebody did choose Marilyn Manson for the opening night of a stadium tour, and that somebody is Slipknot and Live Nation.
Bands at that level approve every name on their bill. That is not cynicism; it is how stadium tours are built. Which makes Jim Root’s “forgive my ignorance about who we do shows with” one of two things: not accurate, or worse than not accurate. A headliner who does not know his own support acts is not a defence. It is an admission that nobody in the camp thought the question was worth asking.
The counter-argument is obvious and it is not nothing. Manson has denied every allegation. Prosecutors in Los Angeles looked at the case and did not charge him. The Walters lawsuit is a civil matter and it is unproven until a jury says otherwise. Innocent until proven guilty is not a slogan; it is the system.
And that is right, in a courtroom. This is not a courtroom. It is a booking. Promoters and bands make reputational calls about who shares their stage every single day, on far less information than this, and nobody calls it a verdict. Putting Manson on the biggest show of your year while a sexual assault trial sits on the calendar four months later is a choice. Slipknot are allowed to make it. They are not allowed to pretend they didn’t. The council can keep writing letters; the only people who can change the bill are the ones who wrote it.
TL;DR
- Sleep Token broke a year of silence with a statement saying they have “no affiliation with any outside musical project that invokes this name”; fans read it as aimed at Arcus, a project teased as being “from the co-creator of Sleep Token.” The band has not played since October 2025.
- Brent Council’s Liberal Democrat leader Anton Georgiou wants Marilyn Manson removed from Slipknot’s July 3, 2027 Wembley Stadium show; the council says it has no control over bookings and Wembley says it is talking to Live Nation. Manson denies all wrongdoing; a civil trial is set for November 2027.
- System Of A Down are projecting their logo across Los Angeles with a countdown running on their site; the two-rose teaser points to the Rose Bowl, but nothing is confirmed.
- The Take: the council cannot change the bill. Slipknot and Live Nation chose it, and they should own the choice instead of pleading ignorance.
FAQ
What did Sleep Token’s statement say?
Sleep Token’s statement, posted to their official channels, opened “A word, for the sake of clarity” and said the band “has no affiliation with any outside musical project that invokes this name.” It added that “such claims are not made with our blessing and are not endorsed by Sleep Token” and closed with “What is ours is here, and here alone.” No project was named.
What is Arcus and is it connected to Sleep Token?
Arcus is a mystery project that surfaced last month with a YouTube teaser billed as being “from the co-creator of Sleep Token.” Fan reporting links it to the band’s original manager, who left around 2018 and holds no writing credits on Sleep Token’s records. Sleep Token’s statement disowns any such project, and the Arcus pages no longer mention the band.
Is Marilyn Manson still playing Slipknot’s Wembley show?
As of October 19, 2026, yes. Manson remains on the July 3, 2027 Wembley Stadium bill with Lorna Shore and Hatebreed. A Brent Council politician has asked the venue to reconsider, the council says bookings are not its decision, and Wembley says it is in talks with the promoter, Live Nation. Neither Slipknot nor Live Nation has announced a change.
Why is Marilyn Manson controversial?
Multiple women made allegations of sexual and physical abuse against Manson beginning in 2021. He has categorically denied all wrongdoing, and Los Angeles County prosecutors declined to file criminal charges in January 2025. A civil lawsuit from Ashley Walters alleging sexual assault and battery is scheduled for trial in November 2027.
Is System Of A Down playing the Rose Bowl?
Nothing is confirmed. System Of A Down’s logo has been projected around Los Angeles and a countdown is running on the band’s website, and the teaser’s two-rose design and venue-style font have fans pointing to Rose Bowl Stadium in Pasadena. The band has not announced a show. Their last Los Angeles concerts were in February 2022.
Metal Breakdown Daily is Loaded Radio’s weekday hard rock and metal news show: three stories, one opinion, a new episode every weekday on the free Loaded Radio app for Apple iOS and Google Play. Follow Loaded Radio for the full stories behind every episode.
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