I don’t remember when exactly I fell for music. Nobody had really sung to me when I was a child and then I suddenly found myself in a choir - I couldn’t hear my own voice, but made a connection with this huge mass of children on chairs. It was high drama. One girl fainted constantly during the concerts and we often had to carry her outside. We performed songs of all nationalities, including an Inuit one. We also clapped in rhythm and went to camps where we sang for hours until I was no longer sure I really liked it.
I got my first guitar from my mum; she’d found eight hundred crowns on the street and immediately bought one for me – it was just a toy guitar. You couldn’t actually play it. But I didn’t care. I prefer scrutinizing things for a long time before I start using them. I got my second guitar from a ferryman who transported people on a big metal boat to the zoo for half a crown; unfortunately he drowned the same night in the River Vltava so I had to learn the chords by myself. Then I started to study classical guitar but didn’t like it much because I had to have one foot on a stool and felt like an idiot. Plus I didn’t want to play with sheet music.
Then a long period of strumming followed, a few years at the conservatory, a few tramping trips and at a late stage I starting playing in a band for the first time. It was called ODVÁŽNÁ SRDCE (COURAGEOUS HEARTS) and connected rock music with brass instruments. I learnt to play bass in two weeks but there were two bass guitars in the band anyway, so it wasn’t too much fuss. I played in this band for three years after the Velvet Revolution until I gave birth to my daughter. Then a few years followed during which time I didn’t touch the bass but went to Tibet.
When Johana was three I was offered to play in the underground band DG 307; I listened to the tape which reminded me of John Cale songs and decided to join them. Thus I entered the territory of one of the flagships of the Czech underground where I have remained for 13 years, changing ship just once. I started to play in the Plastic People of the Universe (PPU) in 2001, after the band leader and bassist had passed away.
Simultaneously with DG 307 I also played in a band called ZBYTKY CHARISMATU (CHARISMA RESIDUES) with the Czech film director Petr Zelenka. We performed very fast punk and nobody came to the concerts. In the late 90s Mejla Hlavsa from PPU asked me to join his band ŠÍLENSTVÍ (THE MADNESS) - an attempt to interweave rock music with new technologies. We played with the help of an eight track ADAT with pre-recorded samples and two bass guitars.
At the same time I started to learn how to use samples myself and acquired new musical software ranging from Atari, various samplers, to Cubase and Sound Forge. I set up a band called ETURNITY which has been in existence since 2000, essentially consisting of myself and occasional guests and a CD entitled ‘Happiness Is a Learned Condition’ was released at the beginning of 2009.
Currently, I am going to play live again; I’m looking for musicians and making new music that’s just a ‘little different’.
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