A run of immaculate albums ended in 2018 with an identity crisis and the producer becoming a kindergarten chef. Now he’s back with a blissed-out new record
When Axel Willner went to Stockholm’s Funky Chicken food truck last February, he only expected to leave with a burger. While waiting, Willner – AKA the Field, artisan of looping minimal techno masterpieces – noticed another Axel standing two places behind him. This was unlikely enough given the unpopularity of the grandpa-ish name amid 40-something Swedish men. “I was like, oh, how will they call our burgers now?” says Willner.
Unlikelier still, not least given how out of the way the spot is, the Axel was fellow Scandi club music pioneer Axel Boman, co-founder of the joyous dance label Studio Barnhus. They got chatting during the long wait. “He asked if I had any music, what am I doing, because I had been silent for a very long time,” says Willner. He left with an invitation to send Boman some tracks, which eventually resulted in a new label deal and his first record since 2018, Now You Exist.
