‘Dead Air Trap’ — Sleep Debt Ceiling’s New EP Molds Misery into Sardonic Brilliance

Sleep Debt Ceiling — aka James Stephenson — came seemingly out of nowhere back in August when they dropped their excellent folk-punk Demo EP.

With songs such as ‘Narcan Supernova’ and ‘Nightmares in the Daytime,’ Stephenson’s angst-ridden voice and sense of irony, self-scorn and sarcasm cast a unique and refreshing take on songs about isolation, depression and drugs, showing off a remarkable ability to convey serious subject matter with biting humor. 

It was as if Gordon Gano’s long-lost brother had landed in Buffalo when no one was looking and started releasing music — emerging in less than a year as one of the most interesting songwriters on the scene.

Now, Sleep Debt Ceiling has followed up on its debut Demo with a new 4-song EP titled ‘Dead Air Trap,’ which dropped today. Examining issues such as guilt, repression, detachment and anxiety, Stephenson’s lyrics are delivered with sharp, sardonic drollness.

It’s a fucking delight.

“A constant electronic hum

It looks like the future didn’t come

I just want you to suffer

I need you as weak as you’ve made others

Paint the whole city gray

Can’t tell the outdoor cats from the raving strays

Burnt wreckage in the street

No one in the world to meet”

— No Longer Human (from ‘Dead Air Trap’)

Unlike Sleep Debt Ceiling’s Demo, which was a straightforward acoustic solo work, ‘Dead Air Trap’ includes full instrumentation, all of which is played by Stephenson, who also engineered, mixed and mastered the project.

“When working on the Demo EP, I was more concerned with getting songs completed so I went for the most stripped-down presentation possible,” Stephenson said. “For ‘Dead Air Trap,’ I knew I wanted to expand the sound a bit but also keep it a solo-effort, so I started to experiment with what was viable as one person in a home studio. Everything you hear is me. That is piano on ‘No Longer Human’ — I'm not the best at piano but can get little melodies like that out. 

“The biggest compromise was that I had to sequence the drums instead of having live drums. I like a lot of industrial music like Big Black and Coil, where the drum machine is explored for its own sake, but that was not necessarily the intention for this release. My friend, Luke, joined the band on bass shortly after I recorded ‘Dead Air Trap,’ so we're looking forward to doing more! Looking to add a permanent drummer, but not in any rush.”

Sleep Debt Ceiling is not ‘feel good’ music. Yet somehow — and this is, perhaps, the brilliance of it all — Sleep Debt Ceiling’s music often leaves you feeling pretty good. That’s likely because Stephenson has a way of writing songs about alienation and depression with subversive hilarity instead of drenching them in self-pity. 

“Getting cross examined

By the cop inside your head

There’s a voice that I think of

And I know it wants me dead

but I’m a dead dog in the backyard

Misery is my calling card

You cannot run from me

You can’t outrun anything”

— Misery is My Calling Card (from ‘Dead Air Trap’)

“I find some humor helps the bleaker aspects go down a bit easier,” Stephenson said. “For me, it's a matter of not making it too overbearing or limited in perspective. There are times where I've tried to write in a more straightforwardly dark fashion and the emotions don't always come across. I'm the type of person to regale my worst experiences as though it's a standup special, though, so it comes a bit naturally. Humor is often a defense mechanism for me, so this at least lets me use it constructively. I guess making light of some of life's darker aspects helps them be a bit more tolerable.”

Buffalo’s folk-punk scene is often overlooked at the expense of other larger genres yet is brimming with excellent artists such as Smitten for Trash, pjn x and Cardboard Homestead just to name a few. Sleep Debt Ceiling is a welcome and significant addition to that talent pool.

‘Dead Air Trap’ is now available on all streaming platforms. We can’t recommend it enough. Get on this EP.

“I often feel like I'm watching the world become steadily more hostile towards human life by the day. Putting some of these thoughts into art helps me process it and I recommend that everyone find something in their life that helps get a sense of agency back,” Stephenson said. “I am very nervous a lot of the time but manifesting that nervousness into something tangible helps me a lot.”