Max and Nathan, aka madnax, have just launched an excellent imprint, Never On Monday, featuring collaborations and original music from Mathew Jonson, Argenis Brito, Guti, Canova, and EVSTAD. Read about their thoughts on broader musical culture alongside the art of production and inspiration.
What are the most essential attributes music can have?
We believe that there are no boundaries between musical genres. So long as we respect quality and emotion at the core of each track, anything goes. Musicality is our only anchor in the vast sea of sonic possibility.
We tend to avoid time or trend constraints. This keeps our minds free from interference that may get in the way of composition. For us, it’s important to maintain a coherent artistic vision while leaving space to let originality emerge from precious moments of surprise and serendipity.
Can you tell us about your plans for the label? And how did the artists come together for the first release?
We kicked things off with a release numbered 000 to symbolize our vision of complete openness and artistic freedom. We aim to compose and release music that tastefully blends the analog with digital with a healthy dose of spontaneity and the unexpected.
We’ve produced a large amount of music over the years, waiting for the right moment to launch our own label. Our plan is to share new music every month or two, with each release featuring 4 to 6 tracks. Unlike the 000 release, which is intentionally eclectic, each subsequent release will follow a unified theme, sound, or concept. Still, we’ll keep the door open to genre-crossing.
Over the years, we’ve built strong artistic and personal connections with many other musicians. Mathew Jonson, Guti, and Argenis Brito are perfect examples; they are not only artists we admire and deeply respect but also dear friends. We’ve performed live B2Bs with them at clubs and festivals, so it was essential for us to feature them on the first release. They represent the heart and spirit of our growing creative family. We’re grateful that they share our same unhinged vision. Collaboration remains central to future releases as well, as we expand our creative family.
Tell us about your musical background and who inspired you to get into electronic music? And about the place where you live and its music culture?
Max started out in pop-rock and classical piano. Nathan also began with classical piano, later fronted pop-rock bands as a singer and guitarist, and even plays accordion. Fun fact: you can hear it on Clown Syndrome.
Max studied sound engineering, which led him to electronic music about 15 years ago. Nathan holds a PhD in neuroscience and works on art-tech projects like syncing brainwaves with improvising musicians. Our shared love for technology and sound made it easy for us to get into the detailed work of producing electronic music together.
Our electronic music influences are extremely diverse. Artists such as Ricardo Villalobos, Mathew Jonson, Luciano, and Dandy Jack introduced us to the entrancing allure of tasteful production, emotional finesse, and groove. Cross-over acts like Massive Attack, Matthew Dear, and Radiohead opened the portal to how electronic music could be woven into weird pop and rock.
Around 12 years ago, we created a six-member electronic band combining African percussion, Scandinavian pop vocals, guitars, keyboards, live drums, and electronic machines. We also spent a few years touring as DJs, before coming back to a middle ground: live electronic music.
Never On Monday is a collective composed of Madnax, Kanova, Olivia, EVSTAD, and F.O.E. (which involves everyone, including Guti and Sarkis). We all share a studio in Lausanne, Switzerland, where we also live.
Who made the artwork? How do you see art and music as being connected?
Creating a coherent artistic universe is essential to us. Art and music fuel one another, so it’s important to us to control both. We, therefore, define our visual identity together and produce artwork in-house. For the initial releases, Max took charge of visuals and video work.
Visuals are a key part of the label. In our music, we often incorporate sound design elements like voices, noises or textures. We like to imagine that we’re composing a soundtrack for a short, non-existent film or an absurd scene. This helps us select what sounds fit and which don’t, and to convey a coherent mood or message.
Edrea, from EVSTAD, is also a talented painter and illustrator, and her artistic touch will naturally be reflected in our visual world. She and Olivia will also work together on a merchandising line inspired by our label aesthetic. The more artforms we can bring together, the better.
How would you describe club culture today?
For context, Max is the founder of Caprices Festival which has promoted club culture for over 20 years. Every member of our collective is involved in the festival in various roles. Having this window into club culture makes us fully aware of the difficulty to navigate authenticity with commercial realities.
Nevertheless, we’ve explicitly chosen to anchor this label in the love of music and art. We hope our message resonates with others. If many people connect with our music, great, but we won’t feel pressure to follow trends or business formulas. Our only guidelines are authenticity and musical freedom.
Can you talk us through how you produced “Love Never Dies” with Mathew Jonson?
This track is special for many reasons. First, it was created during a deeply emotional time, as Nathan had just lost his father. That situation and its raw grief gave rise to the track’s mood and its lyrics, sung by Nathan. It’s kind of an ode to fatherly love and to the brutality of love and loss.
It was also the first time we worked in the studio with Mathew. He visited us in Lausanne, and we dove into the process together, discovering shared passions, especially for drum machines, SH101 and acoustic piano. The creative flow was seamless and natural. It was a beautiful, musical moment where we created three tracks in just a few hours. Two of those even made it on this release.
Mathew has been a mentor and a source of inspiration for us for over 20 years. Working with him felt like playing a tennis match with Roger Federer. It was surreal and deeply meaningful.
Is the human voice more powerful than electronics in communicating meaning? Who are your favourite singers and most revered musicians?
We love infusing vocals into our tracks. It adds a sense of cohesion across our productions. The voice is a special instrument: it adds breath, air, and humanness. The moment someone sings, your ear naturally attends, listens, and interprets. This gives a lot of power to lyrics in communicating meaning, theme, and mood. Poetry paints.
Thom Yorke, Björk, Eddie Vedder, Bradley Nowell, Janis Joplin, Jim Morrison, The Beatles, Freddie Mercury, Michael Stipe, Ray Charles, Stevie Wonder, Alain Bashung, The Cure, Erykah Badu, Lauryn Hill, Sigur Ros, and Ben Harper, among many others. Our eclectic influences each bring a unique timbre and delivery, demonstrating the emotional power of the voice.
What are the strengths and benefits of collaborating with other artists?
Collaboration is truly at the heart of our creative process and our label’s identity. It creates magical moments where two or more emotional worlds collide to form something entirely new. It’s also a perfect way to exchange influences and learn new workflows that help us grow as musicians and producers.
Often, our collaborative sessions are squeezed into limited timeframes due to schedules, but this urgency can bring a powerful creative focus. It’s not always easy to give birth to something quickly, but something always seems to emerge if you consecrate the time.
Outside of music, which artists, writers, painters, filmmakers or thinkers have had the most profound impact on you?
We’d run out of digital ink if we started listing them all here. We’re endlessly curious, passionate, and inspired by all art forms. We draw inspiration from both renowned and emerging artists. We especially admire those who break and play with expected boundaries, as well as those capable of creating masterpieces from simple, essential and raw forms of expression.
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Download/Stream below: Mathew Jonson, Argenis Brito, Guti, madnax, kanova and EVSTAD – N.O.M 000
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