Dedicated to the memory of his sister (who died in a car accident), Morgan Geist designed The Driving Memoirs as an auditory account of a long road trip, placing it in similar company with Detroit landmarks by Carl Craig (Landcruising) and Model 500 (“Night Drive: Time, Space, Transmat”). In a bit less than an hour, Geist cruises through ten tracks of exquisite, finely tuned techno with an eye to the percussion-programming finesse of Black Dog (circa Bytes) and the reflective, haunting electro-jazz of early As One. But The Driving Memoirs does much more than cycle through its influences; taken in whole, it’s a state-of-the-art techno masterpiece that’s more than worthy of its predecessors and arguably the best release to come from the highly respected Clear label. – John Bush