Event: No Streams No Masters, September 4 @ Blacksound Records

Event: No Streams No Masters

Starts 7PM, September 4 @ Blacksound Records

351 Sydney Road, Brunswick VIC 3056

Blacksound Records is pleased to announce a special panel discussion on the state of DIY music and the rise of streaming service Spotify. The panel will be moderated by Blacksound’s very own Lewis Fischer, alongside local musicians and artists Reece Prain and Cher Tan who will be joined by a secret special guest.

No Streams No Masters is an attempt to interrogate the issues DIY musicians have to contend with in today's stream-centric industry environment, but also discusses possible solutions around reclaiming the public square in the face of platforms such as Spotify, who continue to devalue art by reclassifying it as 'content' within algorithmically-centric corporate digital enclosures.

Cher Tan is an essayist and critic, DIY musician and the vocalist for Melbourne synth-grind band ESP Mayhem. She is also the author of Peripathetic: Notes On (un)belonging — a collection of essays about punk, zines, shit jobs and file sharing. She's been published in The Guardian, Hyperallergic, The Age, Kill Your Darlings, Overland, Meanjin, The Lifted Brow and many more. Tan's recently published review-essay Spotify is Worse Than You Think (KYD – 4 Aug, 2025) critiques Spotify and delves into the platform's inherent exploitation of artists, manipulation using pseudoscience and the funnelling of profits into the war machine.

Reece Prain is a DIY touring musician who has performed for more than a decade in local Melbourne bands such as Diploid, Tumour and more. After successful tours in Australia, New Zealand and the United States, Diploid chose to remove their music from Spotify in direct response to the platform’s inner workings.

The discussion will be moderated by Lewis Fischer, former journalist and critic, DIY musician (Altars, Whitehorse, Ignivomous) and of Blacksound Records. His work has been published in the New York Times, Overland, The Quietus, ABC, SBS and more.

Our special guest for this panel discussion comes to us from the United States, and has written extensively about Spotify for nearly a decade.

In the interests of affordability and accessibility, tickets for this event have been priced at $15 to help cover costs for our travelling guest. Blacksound Records is a wheelchair accessible venue. Tickets are available online and at the door, however space is limited and we recommend booking in advance.