You'd have to look long and hard to find a more unclassifiable artist than Diamanda Galas. Her mesmerizing voice sounds something like Tina Turner, something like Janis Joplin, and something like Jessye Norman. It's hard to pay attention to what she's actually singing at first; Galas's voice is that compelling, from the deep, heavy notes of "Iron Lady" to the high, shivering pitches of "The Thrill Is Gone." She takes everything from French writer Baudelaire's "Abel et Cain" to legendary bluesman Son House's "Death Letter" and makes them her own, the thundering chords and deep growls of her piano complementing her astounding voice perfectly. Love her or not, Diamanda Galas will provoke a deep-seated response such as few vocalists can aspire to. --Genevieve Williams
Review by Lisa Schwartzman
Diamanda Galas' CD of live covers (of B.B. King, the Supremes, Johnny Cash and Billie Holiday songs, among others) is one of her most accessible works to date. Her screaming, demonic, cacophonous vocal style has been tamed, and throughout Greek anti-ballads to blues, spirituals, and flamenco-classical hybrids, Galas' voice is shown to be a stunningly flexible instrument. Galas croons, intones, grooves and laments with enormous agility and beauty, and accents her singing with minimalism, classical, blues and improvised piano. "Si La Muerte," the highlight of this recording, is an old-style Spanish ballad with hints of flamenco vocal rhythm, enhanced by both classical and minimalist piano. Live: Malediction and Prayer is a dynamic, phenomenal recording.
Diamanda Galas
Malediction and Prayer
[Asphodel]
Rating: 5.0
To paraphrase Bum Phillips, Diamanda Gala's may not be in a class by herself but it doesn't take long to call roll. Her uniqueness is partially due to genetics, as singers with a four- octave range just don't come along very often. She can both out- bottom that guy from the Oak Ridge Boys and go higher than Mariah Carey on helium, all with perfect control. This in itself is impressive enough to make her music worth checking out-- like reading Mark Leyner or watching Jordan run ball, you have to marvel at the technique even if it doesn't move you. If you're looking to actually enjoy the music, though, it's a tougher call.
On Malediction And Prayer Gala's applies her talents to live, solo performance. It's her at a piano, wailing away about shattered lives at a pitch that could shatter glass. Broadly speaking, Gala's is a performer in the Tom Waits vein, with a perennially fringe theatrical style meant to challenge listeners. Like Waits, she commands respect from the avant- garde community, but her music as a whole has an even narrower appeal. It's not particularly tuneful, the songs are sung in a variety of languages (shrieking in tongues, as it were), and some of her vocal techniques are drawn from the free jazz school of passionate dissonance. Basically, she screams a lot, and there are no other noises to distract you from her voice, just the Steinway grand, played entirely straight.
Gala's has her admirers, and though I'm not one of them, at times I can see where they're coming from. Now and then there's a moment, a phrase, a piece of something that you latch onto and understand. The dirge "Iron Lady" opens the album; a song about execution via electric chair, it's subject matter is well- suited to Gala's' creepy voice. Next is the standard "The Thrill is Gone," which gets a shrill, out- there reading that is way too much for me. It begins with an intense, 30- second vibrato screech, and I can't help but plug my ears when I hear it.
But then we have "My World Is Empty," an absolutely beautiful gospel that Gala's executes perfectly. It is by far the most enjoyable thing on the album, and points to the fact that she could have a mainstream audience if she wanted it. But this is, after all, a woman who published a book called "The Shit of God." So it's no surprise that the next tune, an exceedingly melodramatic vocal workout sung in what is presumably Hebrew, is completely baffling. From that point forward it's pretty challenging stuff, and though I like to think of myself as having broad tastes, I couldn't get into it. Gala's fans will love it and it's worth a try if you're into experimental vocal music, but most people won't want to bother.
-Mark Richard-San
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