Bed of Stone

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Bed of Stone
Studio album by Aṣa
Released	25 August 2014 (2014-08-25)
Recorded	2013
Genre	Acoustic rock folk
Length	47:17
Label	Naive Records
Producer	Blair MacKichan Benjamin Constant
Aṣa chronology
Beautiful Imperfection (2011) Bed of Stone (2014) Lucid (2019)
Singles from Bed of Stone
"Dead Again" Released: 23 May 2014

Bed of Stone is the third studio album by Nigerian-French recording artist Aṣa. It was released on 25 August 2014 through Naive Records. Recorded in the East-Sussex area in the UK, the album was co-written and produced by Blair MacKichan, a British producer that has already worked with Sia and Lily Allen. Bed of Stone is, according to the label company an album that goes "right to the heart". It features a folk sound similar to her previous albums Beautiful Imperfection and Aṣa.

Its lead single, "Dead Again" was released in May, 2014, while a clip video has broadcast the same day. The song is the opening track of the record, it is a piano ballad that deals with a bitter love. The album was acclaimed by critics upon release.

Bed of Stone received widespread critical acclaim upon release. Pop Magazine rated the album 4 out of 5 stars, and called it "a full and rounded musical experience," as well as a more "personal" album than Aṣa's previous releases. They also praised the album's musical style, calling it "smooth" and "graceful".^[1] Festus Okubor Goziem of 360Submissions also praised Bed of Stone, and deemed it a "masterful, controlled, [and] confident album." They further applauded Aṣa for her vocal delivery, and compared her to Florence and the Machine, Alabama Shakes and The Civil Wars.^[2] Bellanaija acclaimed the album, stating that the album was "one of the best albums you would hear this year"; they further praised it by calling it "Grammy-winning music".^[3] Udochukwu Ikwuagwu of The Breaking Times gave Bed of Stone another acclaimed review. He rated the album an 8 out of 10, and called it a "near-masterpiece"; Aṣa's vocal delivery and songwriting, as well as the album's production, were particularly acclaimed.^[4] Oscar Okeke of Lo Batan gave a positive, albeit more critical, review of the album. Rating the album a B on a scale of A to F, Okeke praised the album's production and its lyrical content, but was more critical of Aṣa's vocal delivery; "Intensified vocals and a surge of instrumentals is what the album needs. It’s called a musical frisson, and Asa could have given us more of it," Okeke said in his review.^[5]