Gala Violet - An Interview With Tea & Mickey

Mickey Fingers
Jul 21
3 min read

Updated: Oct 1

The First Album – Playing in the Dark Fairytale

Tea / Celeste (Gala Violet):

The first album wasn’t meant to be an “album” at all—it was play, exploration, and healing. I was just learning to trust my voice again. Writing prompts, journals, fragments of lyrics—they became seeds. Mickey told me not to worry about making it perfect—just write what hurts, what matters, what’s true.

Mickey / Beauregard (Mickey Fingers):

For me, it was about sound. I had new toys—Ableton Live, fresh synthesizers, new pedals—and I wanted to test them, bend them, break them. But I also wanted to create a space where Tea could feel safe enough to write again. That’s why I gave her those prompts—because if the words came raw, we could build the music around them.

Tea / Celeste:

Most of those tracks were just experiments—me stumbling, him encouraging, us layering sounds in ways that made no sense until suddenly… they did. What started as ten demos multiplied—15, 20, 30… then 34... And each one was a fragment of both of us: his alchemy with sound, my wrestle with memory and myth. Before we knew it we had an album and the start to a few other projects.

Mickey / Beauregard:

I wanted her to see she still had it. That the voice inside her was still alive. My job was to catch the pieces when she threw them into the dark—and turn them into something that could sing back to her. Sometimes that meant adding whole layers, sometimes just polishing what was already there.

Tea / Celeste:

But it wasn’t just music. There was a story: The dark fairytale I had started years before became a living, breathing world with Mickey’s help. He made me dig deeper: What chord progression belongs to this character? What sound carries the truth of this moment? With every question, the story grew stronger. (Stay Tune For More!)

Mickey / Beauregard: (Spoilers...Sh..)

We built mood boards, mapped scenes, even trained an AI model with the lyrics, characters, and symbols. That’s when it got wild—the model pushed back, like it was alive. That was the moment we knew we weren’t just making songs—we were making a world. (For Not It's A Secret!)

Together:

The first album isn’t perfect—it was never supposed to be. It’s messy, raw, experimental. But it’s us learning to trust the process, trust each other, and trust collaboration itself.

Tea

Tea (Celeste) – Creative Director, Dream Alchemist

Tea has always lived inside a soundtrack. From sneaking into her parents’ vinyl collection (Beatles, Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin) to DJing (clubs, events & radio) and crafting handmade mixtape covers, her art has always mixed music, words, and image.

Her first Gala Violet was a secret, hand-painted diary filled with lyrics, poems, and sketches. It was destroyed during a painful chapter of her life — along with her singing voice after trauma. For years, she wrote privately and played only for her chihuahua, until the Artist’s Way circle, Mickey’s encouragement, and Velvet Umbrella Records gave her space to return.

Celeste, her stage persona, is the dreamer: lace and top hats, purple lights and fairy gardens, a poetess who refuses to let her voice be stolen again.

Mickey Fingers

Mickey (Beauregard) – Multi-Instrumentalist, Sound Alchemist, Protector

Mickey — nicknamed “Mickey Fingers” for his quick mastery of any instrument — grew up in a family where creativity was allowed, but the family business was not music. He chose differently. He walked away from expectations and security to pursue sound, performance, and the alchemy of the studio.

A true multi-instrumentalist (guitar, bass, keys, drums), he thrives inside Ableton Live, layering synths, textures, and effects until songs feel cinematic. His protective “big brother” energy makes him the safe anchor of Gala Violet, the one who insists every lost voice in the group deserves to be heard.