Monika Kruse

Biography:

M as in Music M as in Monika. A match from the beginning. 7 years old, she starts taking Piano lessons. After college she is certain that only a job in the music business would do! First jobs with the magazine Musikexpress and a promotion company lead to the major company Chrysalis, where she worked as product manager for acts like GangStarr, Monie Love and Adeva.

Early 1991 Monika gains her first DJ experience in Munich’s Babalu-Bar where she played Hip Hop, Funk and early House records. “91” saw her first DJ Residency in Park café also in Munich and from  that moment she decided on a future as a club activist.

1993 Monika becomes a member of the Ultraworld crew who organised the first techno raves in Munich.In the legendary summer of ´94 the famous Ultraschall Club opened at the airport Riem and from that opening night Monika Kruse was resident DJ at that club.
First musical ambitions lead to a co-production with Richard Bartz aka Acid Scout. The track was published on the Pomelo compilation nr.1. and for the first time her international bookings took her to raves in cities like London, Stockholm and Chicago. At the same time she arranged the “Cult” Housetram parties in Munich’s trams or threw illegal parties in empty houses and bunkers.

In 1996, Monika Kruse was selected by the Goethe Institute as ambassador for modern music at an one week music exchange programme in London. There she arranged the musical framework together with T-Power, Mixmaster Morris, Oval and Atomheart.

At the end of 1997 her Munich sound studio published her first very own release, that was soon to be found on the second Loop compilation of Serotonin-Records, NYC.  
After moving to Berlin she joined the label Studio !K7 for a one year as a production assistant. Then with the release of her Mix CD on Chris Liebing’s “Fine Audio Recordings” label she had the opportunity to present her wide spectrum of  techno classics and current DJ Tools into a coherent non stop mix. The CD achieved sales that made it the best-selling release of the label with over 15,000 copies sold.

Monika built up her reputation as a house and techno DJ with a placement in the top five positions of the best national DJ’s 1997 in Germany’s Groove magazine. Only one year later she was voted third behind Sven Vaeth and Dj Hell and since then has always held a top 5 place in the most popular DJ listings of several German magazines. She still is working on productions and together with Patrick Lindsey they call their project Monika Kruse @ Voodooamt, they have released on several labels such as Frisbee, Trackland and School.

At the start of the new millennium Monika created her own label Terminal M. The necessity to fly frequently to various places to do her job was reflected in the name of this new project. First ”Needelhopper” was launched and this release put Monika Kruse @ Voodooamt directly into the charts of Richie Hawtin and Carl Cox. In July 2000 her biggest dream came true. She was asked to play at the final gathering of the Love Parade at the Siegessäule in Berlin in front of a 1,5 million raver’s. At this time Monika was voted by the readers of Groove magazine as one of the “Top 10” producers of the year. Shortly afterwards Monika founded the organisation “No historical backspin”, to emphasize a statement against racism and still today she organize charity events and with the help of over 100 Djs involved the organisation has to date given almost 50,000 Euros to the Antonio Amadeu Stiftung, a charity which helps people who suffer from racial abuse.

In January 2001 Monika alongside production partner Patrick “Mr. Voodooamt” Lindsey completed  their first album “Panorama”. In March 2001 she again worked for the Goethe Institute as ambassador for techno music, this time in Mexico. Together with Hell, Zombination, Acid Maria and others, here Monika enjoyed an unforgettable set at the Mexico City Love Parade. In September Monika toured the USA and Japan. At the WIRE festival in Tokyo, probably the biggest techno festival in Japan, she played in front of about 20,000 people and was voted second most popular act behind Takkyo Ishino but before DJ Hell and Jeff Mills. In 2002 she was invited again to the mega rave in Japan, since then she is a regular DJ guest in Japan, Moreover she became one of the 2 foreign resident DJs in the world famous Belgian Fuse club (Alongside Dave Clarke) and toured Columbia, Canada and Australia. She was nominated for the best national Dj at the German Dance Award.

n 2003 she wanted to show her love to more down tempo tracks she set up her second label: ´Electric Avenue recordings`. Also Monika’s route added another exotic place: China. The summer turned out to be very successful for her new solo release called “Latin Lovers”. Without any promotion the record hit the coverted number one spot in the Dutch dance charts, also hitting a high number in the Spanish charts and the German DDC .

Discography:

Buddha Tunes Vol.1 (Pomelo)
Robot Wars 2  „Metal on Metal“ (Smile)
Monika Kruse „Loops again“ (Seretonin)
Monika Kruse Seretonins Revenge (Seretonin)
Monika Kruse im Voodooamt  „Voodoo“(Frisbee)
Monika Kruse „1.05h“ (Frisbee)
Hoschi pres. Monika Kruse „Sandcrawler ep.“ (primevil)
Patrick Lindsey pres. Monika Kruse „The last night“ (school)
Monika Kruse im Voodooamt part 2 (Frisbee)
Monika Kruse & Patrick Lindsey „U like ...?/ Sommergewitter“ (Trackland)
Monika Kruse @ Voodooamt „Needlehopper“ (Terminal M)
Monika Kruse @ Voodooamt "Stringrise" (Terminal M)
Monika Kruse @ Voodooamt "Route 27" (Terminal M)
Monika Kruse @ Voodooamt "Panorama LP“ (Terminal M)
Monika Kruse @ Voodooamt „Abseits“ (Terminal M)
Monika Kruse @ Voodooamt  „Highway Nr.4“ (Terminal M)
Monika Kruse „Latin Lovers“ (Terminal M)



Remix:

DJ Rush "motherfucking bass" rmx by Monika Kruse @Voodooamt (T-classics)