Luisa Mei’s Qtti Is a Sketchbook of Experimental IDM & Ambient Code-Drift
Genre roulette with a dev-brain twist.
So this one took me a second to really get into—not because it’s bad, but because Qtti isn’t really set up like a traditional album. It’s intentionally all over the place. No real genre through-line, no obvious arc. Just scattered puzzle pieces from various sessions and live sets, which she even mentions straight up: “another compilation of sorts, bits from various sets.” Once I clocked that, it all made more sense. You’re not meant to follow a cohesive story—this one’s more like flipping through her sketchbook.
I stumbled on Luisa Mei through a recommendation (shoutout to the algorithm for finally doing something right). What caught me immediately wasn’t even the music at first—it was the fact that she codes, plays flute and piano, paints, and builds soundworlds from what feels like all of that at once. Definitely got the sense she’s more of a developer/creator at heart who also makes music, not the other way around. And that’s what makes this project so interesting.
Melodic drums? Drum-y melodies?
Most of the tracks here fall loosely under that experimental IDM umbrella. Nothing too harsh or beat-driven, but lots of melodic-rhythm hybrids—where the melody is the percussion. There’s a good balance of softness and structure. FX work is minimal but intentional, and transitions are where a lot of the magic lives. That kind of micro-sound design that only shows up when you’re not trying to overdo it.
“bird monitor” stood out on first listen. It grows in this weird, sideways kind of way. Not linear, not spiraling—just… stretching. But with purpose. And right after that is “big wheel,” which sounds like someone took plucked synth tones and ran them through a washing machine made of glitch plugins. It’s a goofy image but it works—you can almost see the sound spinning in loops, cycling through patches. She’s clearly good at using audio as a visual storytelling tool. Even the track names feel more like titles of little dioramas.
Definitely a realm of experimental music that leans playful. Not the kind that feels like it’s testing your patience—this one’s more ambient-adjacent, improv-heavy but still rhythmic. It lands somewhere between cozy headphone IDM and A/V sketchpad.
Impressions:
Voltage Wobble Factor: ⚡⚡⚡⚡/5
Subtle movement everywhere. No blown-out modulations, but enough to keep your ears guessing.
Reaktor Gremlin Level: 🧌/5
Surprisingly tame! This isn’t chaotic gremlin energy—more like a TidalCycles garden.
Auditory Visuals Rating: 🌗🌕🌑🌑🌕
If track names were Photoshop layers, she’s got opacity and blend modes dialed in.
Soft-Grit Texture Score: 7.8/10
Think felt-tip markers on tracing paper. Smooth, but with just enough grain to give it life.
Improvisation Feel: 🎲🎲🎲🎲/5
Feels like most of it is made on-the-fly or from live code sessions. In the best way.
Luisa Mei is based in Saranac Lake, NY—a quiet upstate pocket, pretty far from any major scene. She’s released 11 albums on Bandcamp as of now, all self-published, and she’s been active at least since the early 2020s. Her previous releases—like Live Code Cat and Migrate Circular Love—give strong hints that she’s working with generative processes, live-coding tools (maybe TidalCycles or SuperCollider), and layered acoustic/electronic blends.
She’s not loud about any of this. No press push, no labels, no fluff. Just lets the work speak. The music feels like it’s coming from someone with a painter’s patience and a coder’s brain—messy in a beautiful, intentional way.
If you’re into the softer end of experimentation—less Mille Plateaux harshness, more early Leaf Label vibes with a little DIY NY underground twist—you’ll probably enjoy digging through Qtti. Might take a few listens to click, but once it does, it really does.