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Cool Room x Next Wave
After a year in hibernation, Cool Room returns with an evening to night party. We’ve partnered with Next Wave for a full venue takeover of Brunswick Mechanics, with a stacked lineup across one room of upbeat club sounds and a second lower-sensory ambient and experimental room.
Accessibility information: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1qPklBXPhVTpS6hYkLRtWUfcV1w47yu6K/edit?usp=sharing&ouid=117914920163520975307&rtpof=true&sd=true
We’ve got a few bucket list bookings finally playing their first Cool Room - including Yuggera woman dameeeela, one of the most versatile DJs in the Country. She’s deeply proficient in genres as broad as techno to trap, jungle to jit, DnB to dancehall - and might be the only DJ down under who’s supported Theo Parrish and A$AP Rocky. We’re flying down legendary Slim Set producer and one of the most technically skilled DJs around, Atro, along with newcomerl dancehall DJ / veteran choreographer, disability justice advocate, multi-talent crip artist Aquenta. Setting things up in the dance room will be DJ Naycab, bringing their compelling energy, fierceness and collection of blazing hot rap b-sides and club cuts.
The ambient room sees a trio of incredible live acts that are perennial Cool Room favourites - painterly synthesis wizard Fia Fiell, community icon Hextape in their cellist guise, and the eternally paradigm-shifting E Fishpool. Supporting them will be DJ sets from Abby Sundborn, an artist whose debut DJ mixes carry the sensitivity of someone who has been deeply listening their whole life; and close Cool Room affiliate Nat Salih, a DJ with enviable patience and preternatural poise and calm. We’ve got a special international guest, in the form of a commissioned mix from American field recording maestro Jake Muir. We’ll have Cool Room’s own Dual Flow installing gentle, psychedelic lighting across the venue and eofy contributing their incredible textural fabric work.
When Cool Room began, we had a clear and urgent mission - to platform and prioritise the safety of women, femmes, non-binary folk and queers in dance music spaces. As time has passed and scene politics have changed, the landscape around these conversations and the way lineups look has shifted significantly. While the work of redistributing power and destabilising patriarchy in electronic music is ongoing, there are so many incredible collectives and artists foregrounding this kind of work.
Disability justice and neurodivergent access is a conversation that has not been listened to enough in these spaces. There have been people engaging in this kind of work in and outside of dance music for decades. There are inherent difficulties in making live music spaces friendly to a range of access needs and lived experiences - resources are often limited and there are assumed norms in these spaces which often inherently exclude large parts of society from them. But there are changes that can be made, norms that can be shifted, people in these spaces with valuable lived experience to learn from - and possibilities to explore in creating wider ranges of access in these environments. Our team is a mix of non-disabled and disabled, neurotypical and neurodivergent folk - we are fortunate to be able to draw on lived experience, and embodied wisdom from our own collective, as well as the knowledge of our extended community to help shape this show.
For this event, we’re trying to foreground access while still bringing you the things you expect from a Cool Room. Expect a popping dancefloor full of friendly faces, plenty of space to chill, support staff and a few surprises.
~ Brunswick Mechanics is fully wheelchair accessible with a wheelchair accessible toilet. There are no stairs, steps or lifts within the building, however flooring can be uneven in places.
~ There will be a large lower-sensory chillout space with ample seating (and a range of seating options), and lower volume music. There will also be a separate quiet room with no music.
~ There will be no strobes or flashing lights
~ We are encouraging masking at the event and will be giving out N95 masks at the door
~ There will be a range of seating options in both music spaces
~ There is an outdoor area where sound levels will be much lower
~ There will be party support staff on to assist you at the event
~ We have a No One Turned Away For Lack of Funds ticketing policy, with concession pricing available and free tickets for Mob
~ More detailed accessibility information to follow, but please feel free to reach out meanwhile at @coolroomtv with any questions, requests, or needs
𝑇ℎ𝑖𝑠 𝑒𝑣𝑒𝑛𝑡 𝑖𝑠 𝑠𝑢𝑝𝑝𝑜𝑟𝑡𝑒𝑑 𝑏𝑦 𝑀𝑒𝑟𝑟𝑖-𝑏𝑒𝑘 𝐶𝑖𝑡𝑦 𝐶𝑜𝑢𝑛𝑐𝑖𝑙 / 𝐴𝑟𝑡𝑠 𝑀𝑒𝑟𝑟𝑖-𝐵𝑒𝑘 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑅𝑒𝑠𝑜𝑛𝑎𝑡𝑒. 𝑅𝑒𝑠𝑜𝑛𝑎𝑡𝑒 𝑖𝑠 𝑝𝑎𝑟𝑡 𝑜𝑓 𝑂𝑛 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑅𝑜𝑎𝑑 𝐴𝑔𝑎𝑖𝑛, 𝑎 𝑉𝑖𝑐𝑡𝑜𝑟𝑖𝑎𝑛 𝐺𝑜𝑣𝑒𝑟𝑛𝑚𝑒𝑛𝑡 𝑖𝑛𝑖𝑡𝑖𝑎𝑡𝑖𝑣𝑒 𝑡𝑜 𝑏𝑟𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑙𝑖𝑣𝑒 𝑚𝑢𝑠𝑖𝑐 𝑏𝑎𝑐𝑘 𝑎𝑐𝑟𝑜𝑠𝑠 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑠𝑡𝑎𝑡𝑒.
This event is being held on the Country of the Wurundjeri Woi Wurrung people. Cool Room and Next Wave acknowledge that this is stolen land and that the traditions of art making, dance and communal gathering have been happening on this land for millennia. We pay our respects to Elders past and present and to any Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander peoples attending the event. We ask that other settlers consider the context of this land and their presence here while attending this event and as an ongoing practice. Sovereignty was never ceded, this always was and always will be Aboriginal land.[Image description: The Cool Room and Next Wave logos sit on top of a blue gradient/green background with several abstract, transparent images blended in. The image contains the artist lineup text, ‘dameeeela, E Fishpool (Live), Naycab, Abby Sundborn, Aquenta, Atro, Dual Flow, eofy, Hextape (Live Cello), Fia Fiell (Live), Jake Muir (US/remote DJ set), Nat Salih’, and the venue and date information, ‘Brunswick Mechanics, 270 Sydney Road, 3056. 6pm - 1am, Saturday 19 November’.]