Slovakian electronic producer Emil Matko has been composing music since he founded the downbeat / triphop outfit MindMap back in 2000, as well as running his own independent tape and CDR label focused on ambient, industrial and experimental music Black Orchid Productions, with more than 60 releases to date. Matko first introduced his Strom Noir alter ego in 2007 with his 3†CDR release ‘The Strom Ep’, and he’s certainly been prolific under the name – in fact, this latest release ‘Luvyoo’ represents his second full-length album and fourth release in just over two years. The eleven tracks collected on ‘Luvyoo’ sit somewhere between ambient electronics and post-rock minimalism, with Matko primarily relying on synths and treated guitar loops augmented with subtly deployed field recordings to create the hazily melancholic atmospheres here. Throughout completely beatless ambient landscapes like ‘Planet Catcher’ and ‘Za Chvilu Je Koniec Dna’, Matko treats the guitar elements to a point where the original source material becomes almost unrecognisable and merges with the synths to become a single mass of flowing melodic tones – indeed, when a familiar pluck or sound of fingers on strings does venture in at the very edges, it sounds almost alien in comparison to its surroundings. Think of this as perhaps slow-motion post-rock to watch glaciers flow to; this is easily one of the most understatedly beautiful ambient releases I’ve heard in some time, with the distant wash of field recorded voices on gorgeous closer ‘Heartland’ simply adding to the sense of inner cinema conjured up here.
