{"id":7582,"date":"2013-08-20T16:29:52","date_gmt":"2013-08-20T16:29:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stylusmagazine.ca\/?p=7582"},"modified":"2013-08-20T16:29:52","modified_gmt":"2013-08-20T16:29:52","slug":"raffertie-sleep-of-reason","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/2013\/08\/20\/raffertie-sleep-of-reason\/","title":{"rendered":"Raffertie \u2013 Sleep of Reason"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\"raffertie\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Sleep of Reason<\/em> is the debut album of British composer and producer Benjamin Stefanski (aka Raffertie) and showcases an impressive blend of soul, electronica, and the avant-garde. \u00a0Raffertie has a distinct talent for creating atmosphere with each track of Sleep of Reason<\/em> feeling like an exploration into a different corner of the same world. And this world feels fully fleshed out with constantly evolving layers of sound moving in and out of range. Only the beats are clear-cut, but even they tend to skitter and break in unexpected ways. \u201cUndertow\u201d<\/a> gets the album off to an eerie start with muffled vocals and rumbling synthesizers, while \u201cRain\u201d sees an R&B melody waver through a wash of reverb. \u201cBuild Me Up\u201d combines soulful vocals with pulsing synths, giving it a strange and ghostly swagger, and \u201cGagging Order\u201d feels like a remixed R&B tune with its choppy beats and melancholy piano. Most of the lyrics on Sleep<\/em> are incomprehensible, but the melodies shine through, like the female vocals on \u201cPrinciple Action.\u201d \u201cBlack Rainbow\u201d burns slowly until pounding drums and crunching guitars start to explode while an angry beat and a vocoder melody makes \u201cBack of the Line\u201d both beautiful and aggressive.<\/p>\n

Everything about Sleep of Reason is dark and murky in a way that reminded of Ask the Dust<\/em> by Lorn \u2013 one of my favorite albums<\/a> from last year. But it does take a little while longer to warm up to Raffertie\u2019s cold idiosyncrasies. Luckily, with its excellent production value and intricate layers, Sleep of Reason<\/em> gives a listener plenty to explore and is worth sinking into multiple times. (Ninja Tune, ninjatune.net<\/a>)\u00a0Matthew Dyck<\/b><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sleep of Reason is the debut album of British composer and producer Benjamin Stefanski (aka Raffertie) and showcases an impressive blend of soul, electronica, and the avant-garde.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[777,1045],"class_list":["post-7582","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reviews","tag-raffertie","tag-ulteriors"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7582","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7582"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7582\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7582"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7582"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7582"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}