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	The following article is from http://www.launch.com/music/content/1,,159030,00.html and is used with the kind permission of Launch. Please note that any links on this page will take you to the Launch website. Diamanda Galas Joe's Pub, New York By Peter Catapano Aug 4, 2000 Nothing is impossible, but it does seem safe to say that Diamanda Galas is one diva you will never see on VH1. She will never do a duet with Barbra or Cher. And she is definitely not a role model for Britney. At the last of her three consecutive Saturday shows at Joe's Pub, Galas invaded the Public Theater's tony downtown cabaret with her trademark vocal firestorm and a blues-heavy avant-garde set full of the ear-shattering shrieks and ululations for which she is both loved and reviled. These over-the-top techniques are familiar to her fans (most of whom are indeed fanatical), but Galas, who performed solo on Saturday, proved that even when expected, her vocal pyrotechnics can still stun. Galas is not a singer in the typical sense. She is an icon of activist and performance art, perhaps most famous for her early-'90s piece Plague Mass, a song cycle about the devastation caused by the AIDS epidemic, part of which she performed bare-breasted and covered in fake blood. Onstage, Galas is imposing, her look gaudy and Goth. But while anti-pop to the core, her work is still connected to the rage of rock. Her theatrics are not far from those of acts like Marilyn Manson or Nine Inch Nails. On her 1994 album The Sporting Life, a collaboration with ex-Led Zeppelin bassist John Paul Jones, Galas put aside the solo diva trip to make a full-blown rock tirade that flipped the gender switch on the macho angst Zep made famous. Ultimately, style is not the point with Galas; her main weapon is her booming, operatic voice, which spans several octaves. She can screech, speak in tongues, stop on a dime, whisper and moan, all in a matter of seconds. And she sings as though she is trying to raise the dead. At Joe's on Saturday, Galas's set may have had a theme, but it was not always clear what that was (her show at the Kitchen last year included a program for the audience, which explained the origins of the songs, some of which she performed again here). Only about half the songs were sung in English. The others, sung in a variety of languages, were moving and charismatic. They had a deep Middle Eastern influence and could be listened to the way one might listen to instrumental music or scat. Here Galas's voice shone, as she sent her notes into unusual territory. The spirits she conjured there sounded sorrowful and wild in the confines of downtown Manhattan. But there was more to these songs than just sound; most were based on poetry or history. Repeat Galas fans might have recalled the origins of the songs, but others may have been left wondering about their deeper meaning, if any. Joe's Pub is a place that was built to recall the cabarets of an earlier New York, or even Berlin, and the other half of Galas's set summoned up some tunes from the American songbook that worked nicely in that setting. But of course, no song was left untouched by her stylized rage, despair, or irony. Seated at the piano, Galas opened the set with a version of the Supremes' "My World Is Empty Without You"--no hint of Diana, no bouncy Motown vibe, just a dirge with a disassembled beat sung in a voice so low and mournful that it could have been coming from the closet of a dark room. For "Dancing In The Dark" (the Dietz/ Schwartz standard, not the Springsteen tune), Galas matched herself against a more worthy opponent. Her version here was hemmed in by Sarah Vaughan's brilliant original. The twisted pitch of her electronically enhanced piano, which Galas played gracefully here, gave the tune a drunken weirdness, but seemed forced next to Vaughan's pure, understated lament. Galas also loves the blues, and she went down that dusty road with Blind Lemon Jefferson's "See That My Grave Is Kept Clean," which has become something of a trademark blues tune for her, pounding angry chords while she drawled and growled the lyrics in hyper-Southern fashion. The most riveting moment of the evening came when she got up from the piano to stand alone at the mike to give her wordless rendition of Ornette Coleman's "Lonely Woman." Here she rose to the level of her master, taking Coleman's haunting melody on a wild, caterwauling vocal ride that filled the room like flying glass. When Galas interprets other artists' songs, they take on a new meaning; she can turn a pop song inside out with her brand of theatrical rage and psychosis. It would be worth a hefty cover charge to see Galas take pure commercial pop, say Britney Spears, head on--maybe a version of "Oops! I Did It Again." Now that would be scary.

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la serpenta canta reviews

The following article is from
http://www.launch.com/music/content/1,,159030,00.html
and is used with the kind permission of Launch.

Please note that any links on this page will take you to the Launch website.

Diamanda Galas
Joe's Pub, New York
By Peter Catapano
Aug 4, 2000

Nothing is impossible, but it does seem safe to say that Diamanda Galas is one diva you will never see on VH1. She will never do a duet with Barbra or Cher. And she is definitely not a role model for Britney.

At the last of her three consecutive Saturday shows at Joe's Pub, Galas invaded the Public Theater's tony downtown cabaret with her trademark vocal firestorm and a blues-heavy avant-garde set full of the ear-shattering shrieks and ululations for which she is both loved and reviled. These over-the-top techniques are familiar to her fans (most of whom are indeed fanatical), but Galas, who performed solo on Saturday, proved that even when expected, her vocal pyrotechnics can still stun.

Galas is not a singer in the typical sense. She is an icon of activist and performance art, perhaps most famous for her early-'90s piece Plague Mass, a song cycle about the devastation caused by the AIDS epidemic, part of which she performed bare-breasted and covered in fake blood. Onstage, Galas is imposing, her look gaudy and Goth. But while anti-pop to the core, her work is still connected to the rage of rock. Her theatrics are not far from those of acts like Marilyn Manson or Nine Inch Nails. On her 1994 album The Sporting Life, a collaboration with ex-Led Zeppelin bassist John Paul Jones, Galas put aside the solo diva trip to make a full-blown rock tirade that flipped the gender switch on the macho angst Zep made famous. Ultimately, style is not the point with Galas; her main weapon is her booming, operatic voice, which spans several octaves. She can screech, speak in tongues, stop on a dime, whisper and moan, all in a matter of seconds. And she sings as though she is trying to raise the dead.

At Joe's on Saturday, Galas's set may have had a theme, but it was not always clear what that was (her show at the Kitchen last year included a program for the audience, which explained the origins of the songs, some of which she performed again here). Only about half the songs were sung in English. The others, sung in a variety of languages, were moving and charismatic. They had a deep Middle Eastern influence and could be listened to the way one might listen to instrumental music or scat. Here Galas's voice shone, as she sent her notes into unusual territory. The spirits she conjured there sounded sorrowful and wild in the confines of downtown Manhattan. But there was more to these songs than just sound; most were based on poetry or history. Repeat Galas fans might have recalled the origins of the songs, but others may have been left wondering about their deeper meaning, if any.

Joe's Pub is a place that was built to recall the cabarets of an earlier New York, or even Berlin, and the other half of Galas's set summoned up some tunes from the American songbook that worked nicely in that setting. But of course, no song was left untouched by her stylized rage, despair, or irony.

Seated at the piano, Galas opened the set with a version of the Supremes' "My World Is Empty Without You"--no hint of Diana, no bouncy Motown vibe, just a dirge with a disassembled beat sung in a voice so low and mournful that it could have been coming from the closet of a dark room. For "Dancing In The Dark" (the Dietz/ Schwartz standard, not the Springsteen tune), Galas matched herself against a more worthy opponent. Her version here was hemmed in by Sarah Vaughan's brilliant original. The twisted pitch of her electronically enhanced piano, which Galas played gracefully here, gave the tune a drunken weirdness, but seemed forced next to Vaughan's pure, understated lament.

Galas also loves the blues, and she went down that dusty road with Blind Lemon Jefferson's "See That My Grave Is Kept Clean," which has become something of a trademark blues tune for her, pounding angry chords while she drawled and growled the lyrics in hyper-Southern fashion.

The most riveting moment of the evening came when she got up from the piano to stand alone at the mike to give her wordless rendition of Ornette Coleman's "Lonely Woman." Here she rose to the level of her master, taking Coleman's haunting melody on a wild, caterwauling vocal ride that filled the room like flying glass.

When Galas interprets other artists' songs, they take on a new meaning; she can turn a pop song inside out with her brand of theatrical rage and psychosis. It would be worth a hefty cover charge to see Galas take pure commercial pop, say Britney Spears, head on--maybe a version of "Oops! I Did It Again." Now that would be scary.