Elsten Torres’ new album, Waiting for Clouds, blends ’70s soft rock and soul with a polished but understated singer-songwriter style that’s mildly reminiscent of Aimee Mann. The Cuban-born New Yorker is twice Grammy-nominated, most recently for his 2006 Latin pop album, Individual. Torres got his start in the mid-’90s with Latin-rock group Fulano de Tal, and scored a record deal with Sony and released two albums before the band disbanded. In the aftermath, he wrote songs for Julio Iglesias and Ricky Martin. The new album — his first in five years — has a consistently warm presence, as if he’s created a greenhouse for his various musical elements as they slowly blossom. From the reggae bounce of “Sitting on Your Throne” to the blues-folk stomp of “Bleeding Hearts Club” to the slow-burn jazz-blues of “The Only One,” the disparate styles come off as smooth as if they were cut from whole cloth.

—CHRIS PARKER