Gail Priest
MESS commissioned artist, Sonorous XI
Gail Priest is a sound artist living on Dharug and Gundungurra land (Katoomba, NSW).
Her live music uses voice, micro sounds of objects, field recordings, and electronics, feeding them into a system of transformation.
In this system, organic sounds become synthetic and synthetic sounds seem organic, shifting between recognisable calls and abstract noise. All underpinned with the hum of an overarching ambience.
How did you first get involved with synths and electronic sound?
I was very slow to embrace synths. My earliest experiments, which continued for many years, were focused on the direct manipulation of my own field recordings. I think this was a way to distance myself from any form of traditional music making. Synths, as I understood them to be then, were keyboards that presented me with more limitations rather than freedoms.
I started to get interested in machines that generate noise around 2015, starting small with a Little Bits collection and an optical theremin kit (my only self-soldered instrument to date). Of course, it’s also around this time that MESS was coming into existence. I had a number of in-depth discussions with Robin and Byron about its development through my involvement with RealTime magazine, and their enthusiasm was infectious, so that when MESS officially opened up the memberships, I was such a keen bean that I landed membership number 001.
How would you describe the sounds you make today?
Sample-based audio still forms the core of my work, but these beds of sound are augmented by less predictable elements supplied by modular synths and live processed vocals. I’m particularly fond of big drones that inspire wordless melodic lines. All of these get brought into Ableton, on multiple channels with multiple effects, to build walls of textured harmonic material. I often introduce some beat-based fragments, or broken beats as I call them, not with the intention of making dance music, rather for propulsion and to make surprising energetic shifts. I also love composing and playing in multispatial formats (multispeaker, binaural, VR 360 ambisonics) as I never cease to be thrilled by sound all around me.
Where do you find inspiration, what motivates you?
I find inspiration in reading and writing, about sound in particular, but also perception and the way things work — biologically, mechanically, psychologically, philosophically. When I start making things, it is often just playing with sounds and listening to the secrets that are revealed when you stretch and pull them. But after a certain point I need to start to put words to the sounds and this often leads me to read and/or write particular poetic texts or theoretical ideas. It’s not like I expect my pieces to then explicate these ideas, but rather the sound works and the texts become part of a dialogue of ideas.
What’s been one of the most rewarding or satisfying moments of your journey so far?
Getting repeatable results! I have a Moog Mother-32 and after hours of horrible bleeping and groaning, I finally found a way to incorporate it into a live set with vocal looping and tone transformation in a piece that I could play multiple times with an established, yet evolving form.
And the most challenging?
Getting repeatable results! Despite that earlier breakthrough, I still struggle to find ways to harness the signal-based fluidity of modulars in a way that feels meaningful and authentic within my compositions. I also find it a bit gruelling listening to all the awful sounds I seem to create before finding the nice juicy ones. It’s a bit like wading through an aural swamp. Eventually you find the shiny thing hidden below the big brown sludge, but by then your ears are full of mud!
Do you have a current ‘go to’ set up at MESS? Any favourite machines or combos that you’re currently digging?
For this performance I’ve decided to focus on the Deckard’s Dream. I was in residence in 2022 and I had a nice day with it with bits and pieces eventually forming the track, Skysigns (Relatives Schoensein 2 Compilation, Adventurous Music, 2023), which is directly referencing the world of Blade Runner. While I feel it lends itself more to keyboard-focused music I am keen to explore it further, and see how I can work with and against its filmic flavour. It’s such a beautiful-looking instrument (I’m drawn to all the things in lovely wood-paneled boxes), and I like the very physical way you can control the fusion of the waveforms. I’m enjoying digging deeper into it to sculpt sounds from scratch, working with tonally transforming arpeggios and sequences. I’m also loving turning the expansion unit’s delay into a no-input mixer.
Are there any machines in the MESS collection you’ve had your eye on but haven’t tried yet?
If you could give yourself one piece of advice when you first started what would it be?
Explore more firstly for my own edification. And only after that decide what the world needs to hear from me.
Gail Priest performs at Sonorous XI
Date: Thursday, July 10, 2025
Time: 7pm
Venue: Primrose Potter Salon, Melbourne Recital Centre
