Mike76

I missed an interesting conversation, but I was on vacation. It's curious that a debate of this kind takes place in a review of the Bella brothers (!). I would suggest to Nofake to move the discussion to the review of "The Divine Punishment," more relevant to the theme of his lengthy post.
Anyway, @Nofake: unfortunately, I don’t have the names of the American prelates who talked about "Divine Punishment" when the AIDS crisis erupted, but there’s nothing to be surprised about; after all, we are in the country where Cardinal Spellman (and here I also give you the surname) blessed the troops heading to Vietnam, telling them they were going to fight a holy war. AIDS primarily affected (and still affects) drug addicts, homosexuals, and the "libertines," or sinners, so it's not strange that cardinals, bishops, priests, and fervent Christians built their moralistic theory on this. Diamanda Galas didn’t invent a gratuitous controversy, especially since she was personally affected, seeing that her brother (who was homosexual) died of AIDS just around the time of the release of her most "blasphemous" album.
As for Leviticus, it’s definitely a book full of curiosities, in which God lays down a sort of behavioral norms; it's especially curious that it also prohibits eating pork (doesn't that remind you of another religion?) as well as hares and camels. Regarding the state of "unclean," I had never interpreted it as you did, as a sort of "temporary disqualification from worship." Nonetheless, for those suffering from gonorrhea, this disqualification could also be permanent (if they didn’t recover...) and thus marginalized from the community forever, "marked by God." Galas drew a parallel between the Old Testament and contemporary times, between the person suffering from gonorrhea and the one with AIDS (at least that’s my interpretation), denouncing the discrimination. Then, all works of art are susceptible to criticism, but one thing here is indisputable: hers was not a cheap blasphemous-satanic commercial gimmick like "The Number Of The Beast" or "Antichrist Superstar." There’s a lot of form here, but above all, a lot of substance.

Um, sorry to interrupt, but if I’m accused of Diamanda having commercial moves...
@Nofake: Well, apart from the fact that her most "heretical" records date back twenty years, Galas has not positioned herself "against God" but against some "crazy idea" spread by zealous "ministers of God," like the notion that A.I.D.S. is a divine punishment for sinners. Galas took them at their word and created her provocative theory that God is bad, etc., etc., but she has never blasphemed gratuitously like some two-bit metal group.
Recently, she took on the uncomfortable topic of the Armenian genocide perpetrated by the Turks just before the Great War. It doesn’t seem to me that Diamandina is seeking easy approval.

Nice album but perhaps a bit overrated. The substance is there, but the form still leaves something to be desired. The sound is that of a band like many from the era, even if the songwriting is quite good. Smith, supporting the Wire, soon realized that his band needed a more personalized sound, which will already be evident with the remarkable "Seventeen Seconds" just a year later.

Yes, indeed Silvestri also made a "brown" song (just to be elegant), a mix between the Macarena and the Cucaracha, but his "Salirò" from a few years ago was just a bit better, and I wasn't expecting much more from him. More than anything, I hoped for something more from Ruggiero: always a great voice, but what a boring song!

I have to admit that when I saw him climb onto the chair, I hoped he would topple over disastrously...

And I would add another question: when will the audience and critics realize that this guy, who looks like he walked out of "Revenge of the Nerds," makes all his songs the same? And another one: does it make sense to "be engaged" using the same silly rhyme that was used for "entertainment" songs?

But is this a song about incest?

As soon as I found out that the rights to Sound's albums had returned to Warner (Renascent had only "rented" them), I rushed to buy this record before it might go out of print. And I was right, very right. I'm enjoying it these days; I didn't think it could be this good, it's even better than Jeopardy. Borland's voice is excellent, in the more intense moments it reminds me of (the best) Bono, in the "chillier" episodes like "Fatal Flaw" or "New Dark Age" it reminds me a bit of Phil Oakey, but he has a charisma and a personality all his own. The other musicians are also fantastic, especially the bassist and the keyboardist. I made a great purchase, there's no denying it.

The sound is not bad, but the songwriting often leaves much to be desired. Rating 2.5

Well....