The Field - Yesterday and Today.

If you’re in need of a strong fix of floaty, ethereal techno that possesses nuances of shoegaze rock and Krautrock, you need look no further than the music of one Axel Willner, the Swedish producer more commonly known as The Field. His next album, “Yesterday and Today,” which will be released on May 19th by German label Kompakt, is an extended exercise in atmospheric electrolove, punctuated with rushing strings, live bass, all manner of electronic whooshing and clicking, and dizzying heights of lush, repetitive groove and melody.

There are only six tracks on the record, and clocking in at just over an hour, each track takes you on a long, cerebral run that combines the minimalist template of German techno and fuses it with an otherworldly sense of texture and melody derived from a respect for bands like Slowdive and My Bloody Valentine. But this is just not another motorik work out by, or for, bespectacled bedroom dwellers. Willner throws elements of rock and funk into the heady mix, their corners sticking out through the slick veneer that covers his beautiful machine music, conspiring with clicks and whirrs to tumble the carefully balanced, fragile, yet muscular creation into a primordial ooze of messy glitch.

Each track is a marathon session of electronic finesse, which will sound excellent in the head and triumphant on select dance floors. For proof of this check out the title track and the one which follows it, “The More That I Do.” At around eight minutes and ten minutes respectively each track suspends you, and time, in a drifting and driving state of ethereal emergency (if such a thing exists). The latter track will really work the dancefloor too, taking it, and the dancers, to new heights, carrying both on a carefully wrought sonic platform where My Bloody Valentine collides head on with DJ Pierre at his Wild Pitch finest and Wolfgang Voigt’s all absorbing micro-worlds.

To crown all this afferent glory Willner includes a cover version of “Everybody’s Got To Learn Sometime,” the 1980 hit by British synth pop group, The Korgis. However, he doesn’t feature vocals in the chorus and only intones the first verse, the chorus being an instrumental section which kinda leaves you hanging. However, given that the song has been rendered by Glasvegas, Erasure, The Dream Academy and Army Of Lovers amongst others, this is not such a band thing and Willner’s take on it is beautiful, as is the entire album. Yesterday and Today, a magnificent listening companion and an extra-terrestrial dance partner.

Orr

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