Diamanda Galas - The Singer (1992)

Tracklist

01. My Love Will Never Die
02. Reap What You Sow
03. Were You There When They Crucified My Lord?
04. Gloomy Sunday
05. Balm in Gilead / Swing Low, Sweet Chariot
06. Insane Asylum
07. I Put a Spell On You
08. Let My People Go
09. See That My Grave Is Kept Clean
10. Judgement Day

While the blues had always been a presence in Galas' work, The Singer was the first time she presented them on their own and she did so in a stark manner, with only herself on voice and keyboards. Her piano playing is fairly harsh and jagged, almost evoking a reined-in Cecil Taylor. But it's her vocal work that fans are interested in, and here she strikes an often awkward balance between her natural bent toward extreme stylings and the more conservative forms that the material tends to require. On several of the pieces with little in the way of melodic hooks, she speak-sings through, adding typically ornate embellishments that do little to enhance the earthiness of the matter at hand. She succeeds more often when the song has an inherently captivating theme, as on "Gloomy Sunday," where Galas' sense of drama and pathos works wonderfully. The highlight, though, is her reworking of "Let My People Go" into a thoroughly chilling hymn to the victims of AIDS. The Singer is one of the more accessible entry points into Diamanda Galas' world, if a slightly confining one that only hints at her greater gifts.

DOWNLOAD ALBUM [flac]