Lusine

With over a decade of experience under his belt, Jeff McIlwain knows his way around a studio. As with every album preceding it, The Waiting Room is his most sparklingly professional release yet. That doesn't mean the Seattle, WA-based producer's wealth of experience and talent resulted in his most challenging work. Rather, his first album since 2009 is camped on the pop side of electronic music. The Waiting Room is focused on song-based structures, and half the tracks feature vocals. It has a slightly different mood, its own rhythm and a more soothing and celebratory approach compared to the focused, alien IDM tag applied to his last album, A Certain Distance. With its woozy, pastoral instrumentals and lyrics driving the narrative, The Waiting Room is aural ecstasy, like a warm blanket of light beats. It's something with which to drift away, where his earlier albums for Ghostly International and Hymen carried you off. In effect, McIlwain has succeeded in making not only a great record, but also a thoroughly lovely one.