Explore Enzymecomplex: A Digital Showcase at Melbourne Fringe Festival 2024
As part of the 2024 Melbourne Fringe Festival, Enzymecomplex offers a cutting-edge digital experience from October 1st to 20th. Hosted at enzymecomplex.art this virtual event allows visitors to explore a range of multimedia content created by Australian independent artists. Each artist has their own ‘room,’ filled with unique audio, visual, and written works that guests can discover at their own pace.
Alongside this immersive online experience, attendees can enjoy a free compilation album featuring music from the event’s contributors, available on Bandcamp.
Enzymecomplex is a modern revival of the beloved Enzyme series of live underground music events held in Melbourne between 2005 and 2015. The event’s founder, Ivan Bullock, has returned after nearly a decade, and this digital platform serves as a prelude to a potential physical event in 2025.
We caught up with Ivan to hear how it all came to life.
How the event got off the ground?
“The last Melbourne Fringe Festival event Dawn Industry organised was in 2010, with 12 bands performing across a wild time span of 6 hours, at what was then Blue Velvet Nightclub in Collingwood Victoria. It was a huge undertaking, and one that was a real joy to put together!
Having returned to Melbourne to live mid last year, I was really keen to dip my fingers back into finding ways to promote experimental and independent musicians via the Fringe. A nice change of pace from recording and producing my own music for a while. In order to put together an event quickly, it just seemed wise to do something digitial. It was too soon to tackle a real-life show, having recently returned to the city, and it also felt like a more managable task with artists this side of extended Covid lockdowns and the general demise of many music festivals in Australia.
A side-passion of mine is writing, and I also have warm recollections of Choose Your Own Adventure stories from my youth. Somehow, I wanted to make an event that losely resembled a virtual gallery, filled with a multitude of artist’s audio and video. None of the “off the shelf” solutions out there really seemed to match with my vision (and struggling artist’s budget), so in the end we decided on just using a traditional website to present the material.
It is definately an experiment! One that I hope works, and at worst is one that I can learn from. I’m in great debt to the wonderful artists that chose to take this risk with me, and share their creations and enthusiasm in the Enzymecomplex project.”
How did you curate performers?
“Thanks to social media, re-connecting with several artists who performed for us between 2005 – 2015 wasn’t difficult. It was just a case of reaching out to old friends and seeing who was still active in the landscape, and keen to jump on-board. Alongside this, we connected with multiple social media groups in the experimental music space, to find new artists interested in the opportunity. We’ve made a lot of great new friends throughout this process, and it was been really eye-opening and encouraging to see so many talented musicians willing to dive in!”
How did the compilation come about?
“Dawn Industry and Darkstereo (two music promotion sites we manage), have released six compilation albums since 2008. The first versions were CD media which ended up being distributed at our events, mainly so guests could learn more about the artists and take home a little piece of the “evenings” with them. For Enzymecomplex, the intention was much the same. To allow the public to retain something from the event for future enjoyment, at their leisure. It is also nice for the artists involved to discover and listen through the work of their colleagues too. Creating a digital release to accompany the event, just felt right, and well-deserved by everyone who’d shared their work with us along the way.
I’d like to extend my deepest thanks to all the artists who submitted work for Enzymecomplex, and made this journey with us! They are the real reason why any of this eventuated, be it back in 2005, or today in 2024!”
Whether you’re a fan of experimental art, underground music, or just curious to explore new creative realms, Enzymecomplex is an unmissable part of this year’s Melbourne Fringe Festival.
Enzymecomplex runs from the 1st – 20th October 2024.
