Daniel Rafn

  • On release Dedication, Daniel Rafn further develops his personal hybrid of exploratory pop and rap to a more crystallized state from where he left off in his 2016 album The Hanged Man. If the previous record drew upon study of one particular card from the tarot, Dedication is more wrapped around verses from the Tao Te Ching, selfishly re-interpreting some of its musings. Comfortable drawing on mystic and philosophical systems as much as the angst and bravado of pop culture, the resulting intersection is so idiosyncratic, it can't help but be completely personal.


  • Featured right in the middle of Dedication's five song tracklist is Portland rapper and painter Old Grape God - one of the most unique voices in the city's hip-hop scene.


  • Exploratory Pop

    Daniel Rafn

  • Daniel Rafn was born and raised in Salem, Ore. and grew up within a tight-knit community of artists and musicians. Influenced by 1980s & 90s pop, Daniel also finds inspiration in entities as disparate as Arvo Pärt and Drake. Daniel sometimes performs live using voice and sampler. He released two albums under the former moniker D.S.R. His 2013 album, Now The Branches Are Coming Into Leaf, continues his earnest exploration of masculine / feminine dynamics, romantic love, and the mysteries of the natural world. He lives in Portland, OR, and in 2016 released is fouth album The Hanged Man.

    Though Rafn creates alone, he's also drawn to the unique possibilities that only collaboration can provide. Featured on one of the songs on The Hanged Man is DoublePlusGood - singer Erik Carlson's decade-long project that has evolved into a neo doo-wop tour de force. Last year Erik & Daniel teamed up with dancer Kya Bliss (House of Aquarius) to create a vibe-heavy music video for Daniel's remix of DoublePlusGood's song Are You Listening from You Can Master Life (2014).

    Also a frequent collaborator with Portland art and hip-hop collective Futro, Daniel has lent his voice for features on several of their compilation releases. Last year Daniel & Futro founder Neo G Yo teamed up to produce double-single Righteous/Makin This (2015).
  • With his new album, The Hanged Man, Daniel Rafn - exploratory-pop producer and singer - delves deeper into his subconscious through the aid of the titular tarot card. In addition to the lighter, more meditative merits of the card, the album also uses the image as a tool of self-reflection, and inversion, allowing the querent to access more primal places. Seeking to uncover and exorcise his darker personas, he seems to be unafraid to let his villains exist present-tense in some of his songs, speaking their piece unfiltered, as he works to find accord with them.


  • Impose Magazine says, "The entire album feels as though it came from another planet, gorgeous and provocative in its disposition."


  • experimental pop
  • Daniel Rafn

  • Are You Listening (ft. Double Plus Good)
  • (2015)
  • The video for Are You Listening is a collaboration between Daniel Rafn, Double Plus Good, and Kya Bliss (of dance collective House of Aquarius). Kya's takes were all improvised - she practiced to the song for weeks in order to be spontaneous in movement and emotion, yet within a familiarity to the material. The song is a fully re-worked version that originally comes from Double Plus Good's 2014 album You Can Master Life. The video was shot by Kevin England and directed by Rafn.


  • pop
  • An earnest tribute to one of Daniel's favorite not-guilty pleasures, his Drake Covers have him tackling two of the superstar's most sultry numbers from his break out mixtape So Far Gone (2009).


  • slow jam
  • Daniel Rafn

  • Righteous / Makin This (ft. Neo G Yo)
  • (2015)
  • A collaboration between Daniel and Portland art collective Futro founder Neo G Yo, Righteous / Makin This marks their first joint endeavor. The 'double-single' showcases a back-and-forth on themes of checked self-confidence, tough-love from relationships, and the need to sometimes sacrifice being social in order to produce music.


  • pop, hip-hop
  • You & Me Both is from of Calling Out of Context (material from 1973-1992, released 2004). Place I Know / Kid Like You comes from World of Echo (1986), an album Arthur Russell chose not to include lyrics to. In Daniel's desire to have specific words to sing for his version, he aimed to 'translate' his vocal phrases into something concrete, while keeping in mind that, as Steve Knutson at Audika Records has said, "Arthur was using sound as language and language as sound." Cello on 'Place I Know / Kid Like You' by Nick Emerson.


  • Arthur Russell