Ratyński’s “Surprise Stopover” Moves Between Strings and Silence

Sometimes, music hits harder when it has no pretense, no disguise, bonus if it’s not afraid to fill the room with stories without uttering a single word. Ratyński’s “Surprise Stopover” does exactly that, and it’s less like an EP but more of threads weaved together with nothing but strings and silence in mind.

Surprise Stopover is the kind of curation that is so much better than what you had in mind. Each track pivots on layered perspectives: how you see the world, its people, and the mundane, trivial stuff of everyday. With only four parts in total, it’s indeed a surprise stopover among the pool of music in today’s scene that talks too much but says nothing at all.

Your Screen is Cracked opens the EP with a disorienting feeling. It doesn’t really sound dark or threatening in a sense but the unsettling, jagged edge pokes you once in a while as Ratyński’s fingers hit the strings. There’s this unpredictable strokes, thriving in an unfamiliar progression with pizzicato, harmonics, bass trills, and arpeggios. What you’ll get from this piece is less for entertainment but more of a fragmentation. Each note extends like an overused, cracked smartphone screen, mirroring the cognitive difficulty to understand the world.

Whatever Your Screen is Cracked established is quickly countered by The Rising. At its core, there’s sunlit brightness in each note. You’ll also hear a sense of grounded layers from summoning a Beatlesque charm where playfulness and precision exists in the same space. It’s light, capturing that exact same feeling of walking through uncertainty and never-ending change without losing the optimism and child-like hopefulness.

Firestarter stays true to its name, inviting you to its depth with verse-chorus structure from its folk sensibilities and early-music undertones. Despite its simplicity, the heavy, characteristic arpeggios sets the track’s tone and weight in a darker, sharper pull.

The Rising (Reprise) wraps the whole curation neatly without washing down the tension and perplexities of the tracks before it. And when I say neatly, it’s not exactly in a clean, polished way. It’s the type of closure that ties the threads together, letting it flow in restraint and resolution.

The way Ratyński stretched the strings of a classical guitar to capture folk’s texture and post rock sensibilities feels intimate and cinematic, flowing naturally all throughout the record. To say that it’s impressive might be an understatement, but it really shows when a musician is genuine with their work.

Surprise Stopover is such a refreshing take where everyone’s fixated on virality and being too relatable. It’s like locking a musician with just an old guitar and mic expecting something casual and half-baked, but then he casually drops complete, meaningful pieces. Overall, Ratyński’s Surprise Stopover is brief yet it feels fuller once you lean close to its contrasts and complexities. And by the time you reach the last minute, you’ll know this stopover wanted you to stay a little longer.