Diamanda Galás Announces New Live Album, Shares Cover of “A Soul That’s Been Abused”: Listen

Diamanda Galás has announced a live album that captures performances from 2017. The recordings on Diamanda Galás in Concert were taken from sets at Chicago’s Thalia Hall and the Neptune Theatre in Seattle. The record arrives June 14 via Intravenal Sound Operations. Galás has shared the lead single from the project: a cover of Ronnie Earl’s 2005 ballad “A Soul That’s Been Abused.” Hear it below.

In a press statement, Galás explained why she covered: “A Soul That’s Been Abused”:

I had a gentleman caller off and on for ten years.
Quite often I had to put him on the shelf because he was quite dramatic.
But I loved him because usually he could take my sense of humor
and colorful language by laughing at me. There was one day when
I insulted him badly; and he informed me immediately that he could kill me where I stood. After the drama, we went to sleep.

The next morning I went looking for my scissors and couldn’t find them.
I looked for my knives and could find not even one.
Finally I thought, “He hid them while I was sleeping!” I lifted the mattress and there was a petty arsenal of kitchen knives, scissors, my stun gun,
my 38 special, and maybe even a toenail clipper!

I laughed so hard that day! And we had a great dinner that night.

A Soul That’s Been Abused was always his song.

The seven songs on Diamanda Galás in Concert feature Galás alone at the piano, singing a range of love songs, Greek traditional music, and the Mexican folk piece “La Llorona.” The former category includes Johnny Paycheck’s “Pardon Me, I’ve Got Someone to Kill” as well as “She,” penned by Bobby Bradford, who played cornet and trumpet with Ornette Coleman.

Galás, who is of Greek descent, eulogizes the victims of the Greek genocide of the early 20th century with her rendition of “O Prósfigas,” popularized in 1977 by Greek singer Manolis Angelopoulos.