Lumia Nights

Synthesist Jonn Serrie has always traversed a spectrum between deep space excursions and sentimental pop melodies. He charts a similar course on Lumia Nights, creating ambient lounge music full of breathy synthesizer pads and cocktail-bar-at-midnight moods. He even covers the jazz standard, "Autumn Leaves" to cloyingly bad effect. Just think Lawrence Welk plugged in. The lounge rhythms are offered up with none of the irony you might find in electronica artists such as Thievery Corporation or Loop Guru, whose grooves call up an iconography that's twisted on its head. It's not until "Deep Mystery" that Serrie floats off into the night sky with shimmering synthesizer textures that recall some of his Planetary Chronicles recordings, but even here, the synthesist goes for melodies that exhibit more saccharine than soul. --John Diliberto