++live
lusine - live pa - percussion lab 023
Based originally out of Texas and now in Los Angeles, Jeff McIlwain - aka L'Usine, Lusine Icl, and finally just Lusine - has gained a solid reputation for creating fresh, well-produced IDM. Since 1999, his releases have earned him the respect and professional interest of increasingly well-regarded labels, from Isophlux to Hymen, and most recently the venerable Ghostly International.
Domestic electronic knob noodlers unite! If you haven't already noticed, 27-year-old Jeff Mcllwain is your new leader. As L'usine, Mcllwain creates insurgent IDM, providing an infinitely distinctive take on the oftstale genre. Armed with prismatic shards of processed electrobeats and nighttime dub-infused echoes of Detroit's past, he's leading an international aural assault with a solid bounty of releases both domestic and international. Mcllwain's sights are boldly set on the future sonics he's pioneering, while acknowledging his formative musical influences.
"I used to really be into synth pop," he says. "Electronic; New Order, stuff like that just the really great reptitive melodic hooks. I would imitate them on the piano all the time." Born in Virginia, reared in Texas, schooled in film and music at Cal Arts in California, and now residing in Seattle, locale, topography and climate have played an important role in the formation of the L'usine sound. "The environment up here is great for making music," Mcllwain explains. "Visiting different places and landscapes has always affected how I lisen to music because I can attach those experiences to it. So, in a way, I would want my music to affect people in the same way. I would just like it to be something that can last."
Taking the influence of different places and landscapes to the fullest effect, Mcllwain is perhaps the only underground US electronic musician to boast the subversive use of one of his tracks for MTV's existential open-air odyssey Road Rules. "I don't really like that show, but MTV sometimes uses really interesting music for their segueing stuff, so I thought, what the heck." The uberemotive, cinematic sound of all Mcllwain's music lends itself particularly well to the world of moving images, and could prove the next front for his aural assault. "I'm hoping to work on some video collaborations with artists I really respect," he says. "Scoring films would be great, too, if it's a project I really believed in." In the meantime, though, the IDM massive must tide itself over with a stream of upcoming missives on Ghostly International, U-Cover and Mental Industries, or simply make friendly with the couch during a Road Rules Marathon weekend.
lusine
ghostly international | spectral
lusine - live pa - percussion lab 023
66.31 minutes | 160 kbps | 76.3 mb
http://www.archive.org/download/PLab023/LusineLive.mp3