Experimental Music: audio explorations in Australia Gail Priest is a sound artist, writer and curator. On this site you will find information on recordings, upcoming activities, an archive of past projects in live audio presentation, curation, sound design for performance and radio. You can also find a selection of critical writing on sound, media arts.
News & Upcoming Events
Flaming Pines: Birds of a Feather series
The Common Koel
More info at Flaming Pines
Pretty Gritty #2: April 28
For the second instalment we welcome our first international guest Alexander Rishaug from Norway and three of my favourite gentlemen & scholars of fanciful noise—Pimmon, Jon Hunter and James Brown.
Pretty Gritty #2: grand granulations
Sunday April 28, 5.30-9pm
Pimmon
Alexander Rishaug (Norway)
Jon Hunter
James Brown
Pretty Gritty:
a new bimonthly home for ambient electronica and other poorly named genres that play with noise, shattered melodies and broken beats
a little bit sweet, and a little bit noisy
beats allowed but not compulsory
See the new Pretty Gritty website for more info
Dates for 2013 are April 28, June 30, August 25, Oct 27
Moving Forward
MCA Level 2
series of dance events curated by dancer/choreographer, Tanya Voges.
I'll be creating a bit of music to accompany Tanya and dancers
inspired by Robert Owen's Sunrise #3
Thurs Feb 21
6-7pm
Free
http://www.mca.com.au/events/moving-forward-7-feb/4516/
Pretty Gritty #1: Feb 24
In 2013 I'll be putting on a gig series at 107 Projects, Redfern
Pretty Gritty:
a new bimonthly home for ambient electronica and other poorly named genres that play with noise, shattered melodies and broken beats
a little bit sweet, and a little bit noisy
beats allowed but not compulsory
Pretty Gritty #1: strings & things
Sunday Feb 24, 5.30-9pm
featuring:
Julian Knowles
Raven (Peter Hollo)
Michaela Davies' Involuntary Quartet
Christin Moraga
See the new Pretty Gritty website for more info
Dates for 2013 are Feb 24, April 28, June 30, August 25, Oct 27
Tiny Portaits, Flaming Pines
The lovely Kate at Flaming Pines has put out a compilation of intriguing ambient business around the complex issue of Australian-ness and a sense of place.
My track, Sugarship Slumber closes the album which also features Michael Terren, Kate Carr, Broken Chip, Seaworthy and Matt Rosner, Camilla Hannan, Tom Hall, Anonymeye, Dan Whiting and Shoeb Ahmad.
James Catchpole from Fluid Radio says " ‘Sugarship Slumber'…Decidedly disturbing, the music sends us on board an ill-lit cargo ship, where the thick, red rust peels from the grey walls. It could have been one of Aphex Twin’s lost tracks on his Selected Ambient Works, Volume II." Full review
Physical copies:
http://flamingpines.com/Tiny%20Portraits.htm
Digital dowload:
http://flamingpines.bandcamp.com/album/tiny-portraits
OUT NOW
blue | green
split vinyl 12inch by Gail Priest & Kate Carr
An exploration of a slice of the spectrum by Kate Carr (Flaming Pines) & Gail Priest (Metal Bitch Recordings).
"This is a fascinating release that demonstrates the powerful journeys that can be experienced through sound. This is very much an album that needs to be heard in full to be fully appreciated (or at least each side in full). However those that take on the journey will discover some amazing experiences!"
Tomatrax. Full review
"We’ve seen a few color-based releases already this year…Kate Carr and Gail Priest‘s new release is a wonderful addition to this collection…"
Richard Allen, A closer listen. Full review
The ice cold cool of blue, meets the regenerative power of green in a new vinyl LP by Kate Carr and Gail Priest. blue | green presents a sonic interrogation of two colours packed full of allusions, metaphors, associations and even cliches
Kate Carr’s blue charts a story of sailors and tides, inky nights and lonesome journeys. From bursts of radio static to the crackle of old records, receding tides and forgotten chants, blue moves from choppy seas to dark ponds and lost tales before closing with a delicate rain shower.
Through green, Gail Priest plumbs the sounds of her own backyard—the greenness of crickets, wild winds through leaves, raindrops on palm fronds and the dark dampness of the wormfarm. Emerging from this verdant landscape are half heard melodies and eerie voices, alluding to secret songs and forgotten spirits.
The final piece on both sides see Carr and Priest exploring the ambiguous terrain where green and blue converge. The artists swapped samples remixing and re-working them into closers which tip toe around the edges of perception to paint a greeny-blue landscape or perhaps one of bluey-green.
"Wordless vocals emerge alongside the rustling of winds, at the same time as dark pulsations introduce an undercurrent of Coil-like unease, and, at disc's end, blue seeps into Priest's “Grue Bleen” to deepen the sense of foreboding and hallucination." Textura. Full Review
Physical item available here via paypal
Aus$20 + postage & handling
Customers within Australia $32 inc postage
International customers $39 inc postage
Also available at Red Eye Records
York St, Sydney
$28
MP3 version
http://gailpriest.bandcamp.com/album/blue-green
blue | green vinyl launch
sunday november 4, 2012
5-9pm
5.45 Emily Grantham
6.15 Broken Chip
6.45 Dan Whiting
7.15 Kate Carr
8.00 Gail Priest
You can listen to two tracks here
here: http://soundcloud.com/flaming-pines
107 Projects
107 Redfern St, Redfern
http://www.107projects.org/
$8 BYO
$25 door and album deal (and a cake if you're early)
RECENT PAST
One thing follows another…
April/Oct/Dec 2012
The project One thing follows another will be an in-depth collaborative exploration into the simultaneous composition of music (Gail Priest) and dance (Jane MacKernan). By working in real-time, at the same time, the compositional process will navigate music and dance in dialogue, in argument; in infatuation and ambivalence.
This project has been assisted by the Australia Council through it's Music/Dance initiative and by Performance Studies, The University of Sydney.
Showing: Dec 7, 2012
Balmain Town Hall
Ears Have Ears - FBi radio 94.5
Eating my own head
(for Robert Ashley & Brian Fuata)
For a week I recorded myself talking to myself—walking my dog, rushing to the bus, wandering around the city. (I used the voice memo app on my iPhone in order to look like I was on the phone so as not to be considered mad.) The aim was to capture my thoughts directly, in spoken word form, without the mediation of writing.
The results were disappointing. I seem to think very little of great import and express myself poorly. But a melange of the lo-fi recordings offered interesting textural material—much like the mush of my mind.
I then turned to dreams that I had written down around a year ago, and was intrigued by the recurring themes and loopy imagery in them—and the fact that I had very little memory of them except for my written record.
In between are segments of music exploring convoluted melodic lines that intertwine and never quite resolve, like my fleeting thoughts.
Maybe this piece is an attempt to overcome a lifetime of writer’s block: trying to find the most direct way to get the inside out.
On air Thurs Aug 16, 9-11pm
FBi Radio, 94.5FM Sydney
live stream http://www.fbiradio.com/on-air/
available on demand after Aug 16 - http://ondemand.fbiradio.com/stream.php?show=ears-have-ears
Click here more past activities in audio, performance, installation, curation and radio
Click here for more solo recordings and compilations