The SCHEMA Collective is an alliance of musicians and artists from Brisbane that have united to support each other, the live music scene and their community.
With a punk mentality and DIY ethos, SCHEMA are active in organising community events that also help support organisations such as Sea Shepherd and Kids Helpline.
This weekend, their flagship event SCHEMA Festival is on at The Valley Drive In, The Brightside and The Zoo over two days with a line-up of local talent.
Here, we chat with Stoyan Stoyanov from SCHEMA Collective, who tells us all about the work they do.
Tell us about SCHEMA Collective – its aims and the work you do?
The SCHEMA Collective is a non-for-profit organisation of passionate musicians, artists and individuals, aiming to unite the underground music scene in defying the status quo.
The punk mentality of the scene has always been about making a difference. We devote endless hours and sleepless nights organising shows and festivals and raising money and awareness for organisations on the frontline of mental health, environmental, and social action.
We do our best to engage the next generation of local musicians and artists, we march the streets, clean beaches, organise graffiti lessons and music events for young people in detention centres or flexischools and have plans for much more social action.
Above all though, we are trying hard to build a community of passionate people helping each other make a difference. SCHEMA is about support.
What are the core values of SCHEMA Collective?
SCHEMA is conceptualised as and will always be a: non-racist, non-sexist, non-discriminating, non-religious, non-homophobic, non-conformist, socially and politically engaged collective.
SCHEMA is not tied up to a style. On the contrary, variety is key: SCHEMA means 'network'. We aim to strengthen our ties and become more active within and outside our scene, to have some fun and make a difference.
Who are some of the bands and artists involved in SCHEMA Collective?
There is a list of 'core' bands, which consists of members from Dr Parallax, Adriatic, Regular Gonzales, Massic, Ffirth, Homeless Yellow, Audiomachy, ex-End Us and Found In Trees.
But our collective has found support and collaboration from many, many of the acts we’ve put on shows with. The list is endless. More than 100 bands including Old Town, Virtues, Novus, Seims, Life Pilot, Like Thieves, Deadlights, God Hunter, Serial Killer Dinner Party, Black Catapult, Lunchtime, Friday Marmalade, Rinsed Out Records, All Hours. . . the list continues on and on.
What sets SCHEMA Collective apart from other industry organisations?
We are not money driven. We don’t view music as ‘an industry’. We’ve been in the scene for 20-25 years each and still believe that music holds much more than the mere potential to make money.
We aim to harness the power of music to transform lives. Our own lives have been transformed by the underground music scene and the message that music can bring. This is why we promote our fundraising shows with 'music with a message'.
We put these on to stir people’s way of life by reminding them about the enormous power they hold and how individuals can form collectives and truly make a difference in this world. We sincerely hope to inspire people.
Why is SCHEMA Collective important to the local music scene in Brisbane?
We are a humble bunch. We can’t say that 'SCHEMA is important'. We believe that any organisation or entity trying to make a difference in improving people’s lives and the world around us is important.
Our message is what matters. Inspiring a vast community of active, passionate people is important. Whether it’s SCHEMA, or someone else doing it, doesn’t matter, as long as it’s happening. The one thing that we hope to achieve is to build a massive network of musicians and artists, allowing people to collaborate within or outside of SCHEMA.
We want to boost the community feeling of the local scene immensely. We want bands supporting and promoting each other a lot more. The sense of unity and not competition is what drives the scene further. We really hope we can achieve this.
What can audiences at SCHEMA Festival expect from the line-up?
We have never even dreamed that by our second year we’d be able to have such heavy-hitters as Void Of Vision, Windwaker, The Brave, Life’s Ill, Fang, The Orphan and many more.
We love involving the under-18s audience as well. We have partnered with Kids Helpline to offer the Kids Helpline all-ages event at The Zoo on Sunday 17 November, which will be specifically headlined by Windwaker and has a killer line-up.
Apart from music, what else is happening at SCHEMA Festival this year?
We are honoured by our partnerships with Sea Shepherd and Animal Liberation Queensland – we have invited them to tell us about their incredible environmental activism.
We’ve also asked our performers to help us generate killer merch packs which will be raffled to the audience. Just like last year, we are working on getting a permission to have our graffiti artist friends to create another spectacular graffiti mural in front of the audience. There will be more surprises on the spot.
How do festival-goers support the work of SCHEMA Collective?
That’s it – by showing up. We hope to show our work to as big an audience as possible. While we hope to be able to generate some funds for future SCHEMA activism, we don’t rely on it. We just want the venues FULL and the fun to the max. That’s it.
We have dropped the full festival price to about a third of what a normal festival this calibre should cost so EVERYONE can afford it. For those who are willing to support us further, buy more tickets and give them away to your friends. Spread the word and the message. To anyone who would like to volunteer for us – get in touch. There’s always work to be done with SCHEMA.
SCHEMA Festival (Brisbane) is on 16-17 November at The Valley Drive-In, The Brightside and The Zoo.
