The various moving parts that come together on This Is Just A Place, the latest offering by Brooklyn collective Field Guides, create a verdant mix of folk and dream-pop, creating music that feels both grounded and distant. Single “Guessing at Animals” provides a wide open space for bandleader Benedict Kupstas to experiment, his narrative baritone centerstage, waxing nostalgically, buttressed by layers of interweaving, echoing guitars and the occasional sax line. It is this very synthesis of hazy instrumental backgrounds and Kupstas’ prescient songwriting that provides Field Guides with its greatest strengths, a release that’s drawn from human experience but presented as if viewed by some omniscient narrator, looking down from space — softly recollective tunes for recounting the past through rose-colored glasses. Listen to it below, and catch Field Guides on February 9th at the Mercury Lounge with Onlyness and Rose Blanshei. —Connor Beckett McInerney
