First steps out of the mud......

[Staropramen]

Earlier I came across a video on Youtube. There is a reason that the screenshot caught my eye. The reason is that I filmed this video myself 22 years ago. The video is of performance artist Diamanda Galas. This woman uses alot of distorted biblical text in her work and back then when I was interested in her music I actually started going to church for the first time since I was a kid as a result. I saw her perform at the Cathedral of St. John The Divine in NYC. She is an AIDS activist and in my judaised mind at the time I just assumed that this was the sort of righteous thing Christ would endorse. I later found a Pentecostal church near my home and despite the crazy stuff that went on there I did start to realize that this woman was distorting scripture in a most repugnant manner as opposed to being a Christian taking God's Word seriously. Apart from the political and pseudo-religious aspects of her work I did still like her music though. But I became conflicted over it. I had a very valuable collection of her recordings and I knew that I should get rid of them by I couldn't part with them. In 1998 I moved to Europe and prior to leaving I shipped 11 boxes of personal effects there, the last box containing my most valuable records, including all of her recordings. That box never made it. I knew at once that God had done for me what I couldn't do myself. So, with that I destroyed the few video and audio tapes that I still had of her including the master recording of this video I saw on Youtube today. But I did make a few copies for friends at the time I made the video. Evidently those copies have been copied. It's really weird seeing this video again. Keep in mind that it's me filming, it's like re-seeing my past all over again. But it was the very first steps out of the mud-pit that I allowed myself to sink in and in that sense it's strangely interesting.