Designer, dancer, DJ, producer, scriber, entrepreneur. Gabrielle Abela is one of those people that many are no doubt secretly jealous of, in the sense that she can come out on top in whatever she decides to turn her hand to. As a DJ by the nom de plume of GABBY, she is one of Sydney's underground gems, pushing her own style of dark and groove-inflected tech-house of which you'll get a taste of via this week's podcast, Pulse.140 (which also houses her most recent track 'Silicon Citizen'). Gabrielle's ethos to life is refreshingly straightforward: Do what makes you happy. Let's find out more...
Pulse: What kind of music were you into as a teen? Can you pinpoint your first electronic music moment? GABBY: My love affair with electronic music began when I was 13 years old. I discovered the radio station WILDFM that used to play a mix of house and high energy tunes from artists like Tokyo Ghetto Pussy and Blue Boy. I guess I was 16 when ‘the realisation’ happened - my Dad was an engineer and used to build stages and lighting rigs for theatres and he told me about this club GAS that he’d just installed all the lighting for. He let me go out clubbing at this age to check out his work which, looking back, is hilarious and awesome at the same time as he was such a strict father in so many other ways. Being in a room like that and dancing to music like that changed me forever. I started clubbing every Saturday night at places like Envy and Home, having my 17th bday at Soho. Crazy.
When and how did you get into DJing? I was 19 and I’d just graduated from the Brent Street Performing Arts course. I was dancing professionally at the time when I met an amazing artist named David Norris (dizz1). He was a drummer like me and we started trying to develop a set with live drums and a form of tap dancing that could act as an interesting element to the beats we were creating. Techno tap dogs, pity that didn’t eventuate! He taught me how to scratch and I became obsessed immediately. All I wanted to do was scratch and mix and scratch and mix. It was an obsession that served me well over the years.
How did your very first gig go down? Do you remember it? Yes, it was horrifying. I was playing records at the races and I was using turntables that weren’t like the Vestax I had at home. There was a button on this new equipment that had been pressed on, and it completely rendered the pitch control useless. This means that I couldn’t change the tempo of the records, which meant the first 4 mixes sounded rubbish until I figured out the problem. That 15 minutes was the worst, my hands were shaking like leaves, I was sweating and I kept thinking how stupid I was to think I could do this for real. I was dating quite a well known DJ at the time too, so the pressure to be good was elevated. Luckily I was able to turn things around and the remainder of the set went really well.
You were a She Can DJ finalist in 2011. What was the experience like? What would you say was something positive you took away from it? The experience was awkward. It was a very commercially based competition and my music is anything but, so I felt a bit like a fraud in there with the other girls getting my hair and make up done each day and talking about my favourite film clips when most of the tunes I liked didn’t even have film clips. I’m very thankful for the experience though, It gave me some good exposure and I was able to score my first gig at SPICE after the finale of the comp.
We’re finally starting to see more and more female DJs come up in the scene in what is essentially a very male dominated industry. Sydney in particular seems to be a spawning some great at the moment. Do you have any thoughts on why this is happening now? All I know is that when I started out, I knew if I was going to be appreciated for my skill and not my anatomy, I had to bring it every time I stepped behind the decks. Perhaps women are doing well now because in order to gain real respect in this male dominated industry, you have to be very good. It’s great that there are more female DJs now because soon no one will care what sex you are, it won’t even be a topic of conversation.
You could say that Sydney has really pulled it’s socks up and become one of the best city’s for underground dance music the past few years. What do you love about the local scene and what’s something that needs to be addressed? I love Sydney and I am eternally grateful to the promoters who have built this amazing scene. We wouldn’t have shared those amazing music experiences over the last few years if it weren’t for people like Matt Weir, Kerry Wallace, Wade Cawood, Murat Kilic and Scott Robertson. As a DJ, I get to just turn up to a gig, play to wonderful people, and get paid. Promoters are the ones who risk everything to ensure we have this great a time. I love that so many of the world’s best underground artists are now venturing out here every year, so summer in Sydney is truly unbeatable. I will travel as often as I can but would not want to live anywhere else because to me, Sydney’s natural beauty is incomparable to anywhere else in the world. Except maybe Thailand, but they don’t have the tunes there.
What do I think needs to be addressed? I think the mentality of many Aussies is still a little backward when it comes to what age you should give up your dancing shoes and ‘settle down’. The idea of having children and being a mum while continuing this lifestyle is a pretty crazy concept for most people here. I disagree. The experience I have when listening to good music in a big sound system and dancing for 6 hrs is a religious experience for me. It is when I feel most free and beautiful. That connection to something higher than this place is an experience that I will always need to have no matter what age I am and no matter whether I am a mother or not. Unfortunately though, I am resided to the fact that as I get older, people in my home town are going to judge because they haven’t yet adapted the European philosophy that age is just a number. Life is to be lived, whichever way that tickles your fancy. Do what makes you happy.
Can you tell us a little bit about your Pulse podcast? How did you decide to approach it? As always, I wanted to blend something classic, something new and something of my own for your aural pleasure.
And there’s a new track from you in there too, yes? Fill us in on that one! Yes! I’ve included a new track of mine in here - 'Silicon Citizen'. I wrote the music and the vocals and recorded the vocals myself. Lucky for my friend grain delay the vocals are sounding nice and weird, just as they should be.
When did you start making music and is there anything else coming up that we should know about? I started making music ten years ago. It was the era of vocal house and I was doing a lot of lyrical writing and vocals for artists like Craig Obey and The Stafford Brothers. Then the era of electro house hit Sydney and I formed a group called Silver Screen which made a more tech house sound. We had a few tunes on the Aria chart but ultimately our sound was too underground for Sydney at that time. They were into disco and we were making melodic tech house with dark vocal elements.
I guess the lack of support for this sound made me want to have a break for a while, so I focussed on some other creative areas in my life, developing my fashion label ‘TROIS’ and the Performing Arts School that I founded in 2008. The beginning of 2011 sparked a new era in underground music here in Australia, so I went back into the studio and started focusing on creating music on my own. It was scary at first as I’d always collaborated with others, but very soon I became addicted to not having to consult anyone else through the creative process. I’m very much enjoying this solo project of mine, and am gathering my repertoire to hopefully gain interest from some bigger labels once I start releasing.
Name 3 of your secret weapons that never fails to get a dancefloor back on track.'Getting Lost' - Philip Bader
'Closed' - Samu.l and anything by German Brigante. He is the master of the solid groove.
What’s happening for you gig wise this summer? While I can’t tell you about all the crazy bananas adventures that I’ll be galavanting on, I can tell you that I’ll be supporting some of my favourites over the next three months. In November, you might find me in a Michael Jackson costume sharing the stage with Matthias Tanzmann, Francesca Lombardo and Ame at the best Halloween party ever - Circoloco. I’ll be setting sail on the AGWA boat in December, supporting some huge acts at the finest pool party in Sydney, and dancing till the sun comes up and then some, at my favourite places S.A.S.H and SPICE. Pinch me please. See you on the floor x