On his debut LP, “Continent,” Montreal producer CFCF (a.k.a. Mike Silver) has gathered elements from disco, house, italo, and two-step garage, scaled their sounds back from the dance floor, and stretched them out with an emotive atmosphere that is, at times, cinematic. This is dance music on a night off, staying in, and watching its favorite movies. “Letters Home” has the Ewoks stumbling upon Derrick May’s “String Of Life” and sampling it for the ultimate treetop victory anthem, while “Invitation to Love” feels like the result of  Alan Parsons Project watching American Gigolo on repeat. It may sound awkward, perhaps even unsettling to any stubborn electronic music purist, but CFCF makes it work for the rest of us by putting it all together with a very pop-friendly sound. The young producer’s (he’s only 21) debut LP is 12 tracks of emotive electronic dance pop that feature a mature restraint on their influences. The songs never quite drive over into floor filling compact dance anthems, and hold back from stretching way out into the epic ambient soundscapes of a Vangelis-style production. The album finds a compromise between the dance and film score influences, and allows Silver’s music to be grand, diverse, vibrant, and at times, almost catchy. Album standout, “Big Love,” has the Fleetwood Mac track re-worked through CFCF’s apt combining of Chicago house-style piano loops, sun-soaked balearic guitars and his own pitched vocals resampled over each other. It’s an outstanding track, and the best example of everything he does well on the album. Taking what he loves about dance music, Silver reshapes the genre to sound like the end sequence to a film about love/beaches/victory at sunset, and doesn’t let it get too out of hand by putting it all together with an accessible pop sensibility, friendly enough for everyone’s ears and speakers.

- Paul Johnston