The Field

At this point in his career, it's safe to say that Axel Willner is sticking to this "looping" thing. With three albums as the Field and one under the moniker Loops of Your Heart, Willner has exorcised transitory, hypnotic sound loops in order to create his idiosyncratic version of microhouse. After flirting with live instrumentation on 2011's Looping State of Mind, Willner wrote and recorded his latest Field recording, Cupid's Head, using only sampling hardware. The resulting six widescreen compositions represent a sonic culmination of everything the Swedish producer has worked on up to this point. By ditching his laptop, tracks like "They Won't See Me" and "No. No" feel more textural and organic, as beats and loops idly piggyback upon each other, while even the album's punchier material, like "Black Sea" and the title track, take on a shoegaze-y haze. On Cupid's Head, the Field demonstrates his expert ability to move forward with his craft while still retaining his signature voice.