You co-founded Naarm/ Melbourne music collective Melt with Goo DJ and Juicy Velour. Together running a local party series as well as being DJs/producers in your own right. How has the transition from irl events into the online space during lockdown been for you?

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It went better than expected! We started our own mix series and Gabi (Goo DJ) and I have also kept productive working on DJ mixes for other crews and Andy (Juicy Velour) has been producing and releasing some great music, so overall lockdown hasn’t been too bad productivity-wise for us.

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The local electronic music community interacts almost exclusively within a virtual space at the moment. What are some positive experiences you’ve had because of this?

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Starting a melt mix series has really helped keep us active and it turned out to be such a nice way to connect with so many other people in the dance music community like yourself that we probably wouldn’t have met otherwise. We had never planned on doing a mix series before this all happened so it’s definitely been a great silver lining and something I’m very glad we did. It’s weird to be coming out of iso and anticipating meeting all these new internet friends I’ve made once we’re all out again.

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Melbourne has had the longest and strictest lockdown in Australia, what are some self care tools that have helped you adapt to your situation?

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Well, my housemates and I decided a couple of months into lockdown to move out of our small inner-city terrace house into a nice big one further out with a huge yard. This gave us way more indoor and outdoor space, which we needed to stave off cabin fever while we all worked from home. We even have room to set up a pool and we’re also getting trampoline soon! Besides that, I’ve been doing the usual self-care stuff like exercise, yoga, reading more, having little home parties and enjoying some guilt-free time doing nothing.

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Has lockdown changed the type of music you’ve been listening to and collecting?

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Hmmm, it surprisingly hasn’t I don’t think. At least in terms of tracks I collect. I’d say the biggest difference is that I’m listening to a lot more mixes, which has been nice.

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What’s your dream gig/ party look like post lockdown?

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I can’t wait to start having melt events at the Gaso once again! The last event we threw was a joint party with another crew called Love Sensation where they curated the downstairs room and we curated upstairs. It was a sell out event, we raised a bunch of money for bushfire causes and it was lots of fun. We were in the process of organising another one before covid hit. So getting that happening is probably what I’m looking forward to the most!