My Dreams Never Sleep - My Dreams Never Sleep

What this video is

Released in March 2019 as a visual companion to the track from Knife Knights' debut album 1 Time Mirage (Sub Pop, September 2018), this animated video sits at the intersection of afrofuturism, Seattle underground hip-hop, and the broader experimental hip-hop scene cultivated by Ishmael Butler across Digable Planets and Shabazz Palaces. Knife Knights — the collaborative project of Butler and producer/composer Erik…

Why it matters

Represents the animated video tradition in left-field hip-hop and afrofuturism, where surrealist visual language reinforces the genre's spatial and conceptual experimentation. The pairing of an underground animator (Joe Garber) with an experimental hip-hop act distributed by a major indie label…

The director

Joe Garber is a Seattle-based freelance animator, director, and graphic novelist. He began working as a full-time freelance animator in 2010, serving clients including Microsoft and Vanity Fair. His portfolio spans music videos, commercial animation,…