Deadbeat Journeyman’s Annual
Montreal producer Deadbeat has forged a formidable body of digital dub sweetness for Stefan Betke’s […]
Montreal producer Deadbeat has forged a formidable body of digital dub sweetness for Stefan Betke’s ~scape, imbuing the Jamaican art form with poignancy and microscopic textural grit redolent of electronic music’s most advanced labs. His fifth album, Journeyman’s Annual, bears a richer sound than past Deadbeat full-lengths: thicker bass frequencies, more spacious high-end bric-a-brac, crisper beats, and more varied rhythms. Journeyman’s Annual is also more emotionally and stylistically diverse. “Refund Me” features MC Bubbz rapping over hectic dancehall with crushing bass pressure and rampant cowbell clatter. “Lost Luggage” incorporates dubstep’s bleak, pitch-black atmospheres, while the cavernous and metallically oscillating “Loneliness and Revelry” sounds like a collaboration between Burial and Maurizio. This is anything but journeyman stuff.