Unlike previous albums from the duo, The Campfire Headphase features the addition of more organic musical elements, including heavily treated acoustic guitars and more conventional song structures.

[1] According to Michael Sandison, compared with their previous releases, they aimed to "simultaneously shift and reduce the sound palette, making it more like a conventional band gone over the edge.

[1] Regarding their process, Sandison stated that: We usually imagine our music to have a visual element while we're writing it, so we were picturing this character losing his mind at the campfire and compressing weeks of events into a few hours, in that time-stretching way that acid fucks with your perception.

[3] Mark Richardson of Pitchfork noted that the group's use of guitars "makes explicit something about the band's sound that was always just beneath the surface: the connection of the music to the pastoral tradition of British folk," but noted that "the best thing Campfire Headphase has going is its unnamable synthesizer sounds," and concluded that its "blissed-out narcotic interludes don't come quite often enough, though, and in fact this feels like a step down from the last two albums.

"[11] Simon Reynolds of The Observer wrote that "blurring the boundaries between rock and techno is a smart move, because BoC have always made music that deserved to appeal beyond the electronic audience", and praised "the stereophonic delirium of their production.