Area 3000

Detroit-born, Atlanta-based DJ, writer and curator Ash Lauryn joins Area 3000 Radio ahead of her Australian debut at Freeform Festival in Melbourne. In this conversation, Ash discusses the origins of Underground in Black — her platform championing the Black roots of house and techno, now a monthly NTS radio show and event series — and reflects on rereading her original 2017 blog post a decade on. She speaks candidly about balancing motherhood with international touring and the "Mother May I" family day parties she's built, shares the story of her first rave at age 14 in Detroit, and gives her perspective on AI's growing presence in dance music production. Ash Lauryn plays Freeform Festival, Sydney Myer Music Bowl, Melbourne — Saturday, Garden Stage, 3:15–5pm — alongside Richie Hawtin, Ben UFO and a stacked local lineup. Hosted by Sindy Smith for Area 3000 Radio.

Hermitude are 25 years deep, eight albums in, and recently finished a national tour. In this interview, the Blue Mountains duo join Sindy at Area 3000 Radio to talk about what it meant to fall back in love with club music, how they both independently landed on the same album title in the middle of the night, and why making Eight has been one of the most joyful creative experiences of their career. Expect the origin story behind the Hermitude name (it involves a Ren & Stimpy bender and a lift ride), a Bunnings collab origin story, and a candid look at what's kept a 25-yearcreative partnership alive, including the times it almost wasn't. Eight is out now.

Area 3000's Sindy sits down with Dan Crosby, label boss of Leeds-based Permission to Dance Records, ahead of the launch of their biggest project to date: No Signal, a 14-track vinyl compilation featuring exclusively Australian artists, dropping April 17th. Dan talks about how PTD started during lockdown, how Australia became the label's heartland, the process of curating a VA designed to be listened to like an album, pressing vinyl for the first time, advice for anyone thinking about starting their own label, and what's next for PTD Records.

We welcome special guest ŽIVA - the solo project of Croatian-born, Melbourne-based artist Lucija Ivšić, whose second album ŽIIVA is out now. Lucija's story is genuinely remarkable: she fronted acclaimed Croatian post-punk band Punčke from age 14, touring 30 countries and sharing stages with Queens of the Stone Age, before walking away at the band's peak, moving to Melbourne, and starting completely over. Now a PhD researcher at Monash University and lecturer at Monash Arts, she creates visceral, bilingual electronic music built live in real time through looping, vocal processing, and instrumentation. In this episode we talk about why ŽIIVA almost didn't come out - the perfectionism spiral, the friendship fallouts, and the knee injury that happened mid-stage-dive during a Brunswick show, leaving her bedridden for months with a metal brace. We also get into what it actually takes to build a song live from nothing in front of an audience, how Croatian folk traditions and language became a tool for reclaiming identity in displacement, and the limited edition 3D-printed CD she hand-assembled herself. ŽIIVA is out now. ŽIVA plays Cactus Room, Thornbury on Friday 17 April.

We sat down with New York-based DJ and budding music producer DJ DOU during his first trip to Melbourne, Australia. In this conversation, he opens up about how he learned to DJ in just two weeks before his first gig, playing back-to-back with one of his biggest inspirations, the importance of not comparing yourself to others, and why Four Tet changed the way he thinks about music. A genuine, honest chat about creative growth, staying grounded, and what it means to just keep showing up.