Join us for the ninteenth edition of HEAR THE MACHINE, a monthly series showcasing experimental synthesiser music, including drone, ambient, noise, and other electronic music practices being explored by artists in Naarm and the wider community.
HEAR THE MACHINE happens on the last Sunday of the month, at Nighthawks Bar - 136 Johnston street Collingwood.
HEAR THE MACHINE #19
April 26th 2026
7pm doors
$15/10 (no presales)
The artists:
Mallee Songs.
Mallee Songs is the fifteen-year musical project of Michael Skinner, alongside frequent collaborators Casey Harnett and Pascal Babare. Across four albums, the group has moved through ambient folk and psychedelic country to arrive at Instrumentals—a suite of synth-based pieces balancing analog warmth with glassy digital shimmer. Michael and Casey will perform in this vein for Hear the Machine on April 26.
Kristina Behrsin.
Kristina is a multi-instrumentalist, performer, composer, and music educator. She has been performing since the age of four and has explored various performance styles and approaches, from avalanche pop to bespoke instrument building and scoring, and avant‑garde electronica. Her untrained, raw vocal technique blends with her use of both analogue and digital synthesisers to create hyper-dynamic works guided by her love of minimalist electronic composing approaches and abstract beat‑building. Kristina has composed synthesiser parts for her own works, often under the moniker Niine, and has played keyboards for bands such as Jolistics, Tamar Murphy and the Golden Retrievers, Brian Campeau, The Terrifying Lows, Messy Mammals, and BLUME.
Justin Ashworth & Abi Lee.
Abi grew up with a love of music, taking up piano at age 5. In 2021, she relocated from Tāmaki Makaurau/Auckland to Naarm/Melbourne drawn by her love of Australian Jazz. She has become well known as an emerging pianist and artist in Naarm, performing her original music regularly. Her musical voice and improvisational approach are reminiscent of pianists Paul Bley and Keith Jarrett. In this collaboration Abi will be exploring the possibilities with the sounds of the Korg poly800
Justin Ashworth has been haunting the fringes of the Melbourne experimental music scene for over 25 years, in the bands Glasfrosch, and of, or pertaining to… and spearheading projects and events including Little Songs of the Mutilated and Hear The Machine. His current obsessions involve modular synthesis, rhythmic minimalism, and the aesthetic extremes of ambient and noise musics. For this collaboration Justin will be exploring the rhythmic possibilities of a small generative eurorack system patched to interact with Abi’s actual musicality.
We acknowledge the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin Nation, the true owners and custodians of the land where this event takes place. Always was. Always will be.
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