Diamanda GalásBest Diamanda Galás Albums Ranked

Defixiones: Will and Testament (Live)

pitchfork

8.5

“In November of 2002, as part of a conference honoring the late novelist Kathy Acker, Diamanda Galás' multi-octave voice bellowed and howled through the midrange speaker's of NYU's Fales Library. Due to a previous engagement in Canada, the vocalist was unable to perform in the flesh, so she sent a multi-track recording in her stead. As preferable as it is to watch her unleash her intense Siren song”

Broken Gargoyles

pitchfork

7.7

“Based upon early 1900s German poetry about sick patients and maimed soldiers, these two side-long tracks of experimental vocalizations highlight the singer’s conceptual, confrontational heft.”

At Saint Thomas the Apostle Harlem (Live)

pitchfork

7.5

“Three and a half decades on, Diamanda Galás still talks about her singing as an act of violence. She shreds the American songbook on two new records, with a restrained version of her deadly approach.”

De-Formation: Piano Variations

loudandquiet

7.0

“Cancer is a death sentence, opined Susan Sontag in Illness As Metaphor, such that it must be hidden from the patient, “to de-mythicize” it. Tuberculosis had also invited secrecy, as if to mention it by name would truly seal the patient’s fate. We can hardly say the same of Covid-19, with each new day saturated with news of the spread whether we want to hear or not. But there is a hidden element t”