An alternative to ASMR for sleep.

Why it works

ASMR works on texture: whispering, tapping, the close sound of a brush. For some people that is deeply settling, and for others it does nothing, or is faintly alarming. If you are in the second group, you may still like what sits underneath it, which is a quiet presence late at night.

This is that presence with content. A level voice, not a whisper, reads something true and unhurried over pink noise. The attention it asks for is the idle kind you give a radio in another room. It has no triggers and no close microphone, and it ends more quietly than it begins.

What you are hearing

• Pink noise. Equal energy in every octave, made with Paul Kellet's pinking filter and rolled off above 2,500 Hz. Brighter than brown, softer than white.
• The voice. The first four minutes of Aristotle, the Greatest Philosopher, a Lullable story, in a synthesised voice. It only plays if you bring it in.
• The ending. The preview lasts four minutes. Its last ten seconds are a straight fade to silence, so it never stops abruptly.

For a real recording that runs forty minutes, the Lullable iPhone app has rain, waves, a campfire and plain noise, with no voice and no music.