Release date: 16th of October 2023
Pre-order via Bandcamp NEXT Festival Records.
The single ‘Ylvia‘ out on 18th of October 2023 via Bandcamp NEXT Festival Records.

Slovakian producer Monika Subrtova presents her first solo LP on Bratislava based label Next Records.

Based in Bratislava, Slovakia, Next Festival is a conformity-dodging event which seeks to platform daring, esoteric and uncompromising Electronic Music.

Having operated since the year 2000, the project has since grown to incorporate a label which utilizes vinyl and cassette recordings to crystallise selected sonics from the festival, giving permanence to otherwise ephemeral artistic expressions.

Releases from ErikM & DJ Sniff, Palmovka and Shibuya Motors have showcased radical, free-flowing work, finished with a certain mechanical brutalism and next in line is fellow Slovakian Monika Subrtova who presents ‘TOON’ – a collection of chilly visions drawing on influences from 90s Electronica, Techno and film composition.

Until recently, the majority of Subrtova’s work has been released and performed alongside Daniel Kordik under their raucous project Jamka. Whether working collaboratively or alone – Subrtova adopts the spirit of modular synthesis, allowing music to unfurl naturally through presence with the machines and progressive parameter adjustment.

Here – she applies this organic methodology to the Elektron Rytm MK2 and Novation Peak which she uses to bring together minor-key melodies, pin-prick signals, scattered rhythms and palpable textures which echo influences from Vatican Shadow, Keiji Haino or Tropic of Cancer.

‘TOON’ comes as the successor to her first solo outing on the Slovakian label Urbsounds. Her ‘Omnia’ EP laid out the seeds for the LP – seeds which now germinate across six musical depictions of a maladjusted species against a dystopian, industrial backdrop.

Pockets of beauty blossom against a bed of malaise which is a contrast that dovetails her music neatly with the Next Records catalog and provides a captivating window into Monika Subrtova’s creative mind.

MONIKA SUBRTOVA – BIOGRAPHY

London based – Slovakian born Monika Subrtova is an experimental electronic musician who uses sound synthesis and sampling to render lucid, dystopian imagery. Her work draws on a wide range of influences from avant-garde to club tracks – from Suzanne Ciani to Vatican Shadow and her approach in the studio is to foster a symbiotic flow between her and the myriad parameters of her machines.  

When she turns the power on – she welcomes egalitarian creative control between her and her instruments. The path, progression and mood of the output are as much in the hands of the hardware as they are her as she aims to adopt a position of presence; that is – maintaining creative plasticity in allowing what will happen to happen. 

This form of dialogue is often expressed via dilated drones, frosty sonics, skeletal rhythms and broad spatial sound design. These are the components that form the foundation of her ruminative solo work as well as the more boisterous collaborative work she produced alongside Daniel Kordik as Jamka – a project which dwelled in the more menacing pockets of Techno and Industrial noise.

Through Subrtova’s recent ‘Omnia’ EP on Slovakian label Urbsounds – she presented three mechanical exercises which laid out a rubric for her subsequent LP ‘TOON’ which is due on the label sub-division of Bratislava based event Next Festival. ‘TOON’ acts as a statement of artistic vision – a batch of six essays within which Subrtova explores the beauty of attendance; the joy and meaning in simply allowing energy to course from brain > machines > audio.