GALA - Parallel Lines (live premier 5am GMT)

straightorbroken

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GALA is back and about to steal Geru Halliwell's Lilith Fair invite with a beautiful, crestfallen ballad wanting us to surrender gender boundaries, any hopes of another Freed From Desire, andvmost of all our wallets. The snippets are out, and I'm already more clogged up than Michelle McManus saying "I wouldn't go in there if I were you", but I'm going to be patient and count every second for the next 3 hours until a new future entry to the moopy pop archives is set free. It seems a new video has been made and for now the original video (featuring a stunning shot of GALA Roadkill lying on the floor) is being airbrushed out. The video is a peice by activist Nina Paley and will be for Corona what John Lewis thinks they are for Christmas.

 
Stroke of midnight (she's NYC) for her latest stroke of genius.

I mean, you'd think she would do it all at 10pm in tribute to her classic album track:

 
If 10 was a big number for GALA and Trevor McDonald, and a distant dream for Jane McDonald, I'm going to run down 10 of my fave GALA perfs, which won't just be the first 10 I find on the YouTube (it might be).
 
Run, GALA, run. Aided by her backing vocalists Esperanza Reader, GALA stands there and probably doesn't hit a single note (and who would want her to whilst we all scramble for something to hold onto as the eurotrash rhapsody usurps?)

 
The Beautiful was the follow-up to her impressive Taste of Me. The comedown of a ballad echoing familiar themes of money may be a little jarring at first, but make no mistake this is a crowd pleaser and the effort of the dance is a performer living and breathing what they do. Incredible.

 
Kate Middlemiss's intro is iconic to me in a way that just always makes me smile. This was the first I'd seen of GALA performing, having been on holiday when she did the first batch of totp perfs that were all bat-shit-tastic we didn't deserve quite frankly. Here she is keeping a straight face whilst 2 girls who failed the audition for Vanilla give it laldi (or Lidl):



I played this back on VHS probably more times than the amount of copies the next UK single would sell.
 
Here we see GALA invented clapping long before the NHS. She would reunite with this dance man years later. So he actually came back into her life.



Almost a rave up, the Italo disco almost goes unnoticed as we wonder what key she'll switch to next, but it's utterly deluxe.
 
GALA really looked set for a moderate comeback with Lose Yourself In Me. The best shot she had seemed to be Lebanon, where she had a genuine radio hit on her hands. The starkly hooky Depeche Mode style is dazzling and of course the glittering prize will always be GALA Mode with her unmistakable dancing, masculine posturing and unequivocal stature. Here we are thankfully treated to a lip sync:

 
However, here we have the most glorious mess of a vocal that is her Sochi concert during the Olympics (opening her set with Let A Boy Cry for a political statement). The performance is so kinetic and an orgasm for every sense apart from one's ears, but I'd honestly have been carried out in a stretcher after this bit of the show.

 
Here she is in Barcelona, basking in a thousand Allas. If it weren't for Corona I had my heart set on seeing her there and in Dublin this year (sigh)

 
Around 10 years back, GALA took a hit and brought her 3 hits with her to join the 90s dance nostalgia circuit. No allowed to perform her new material (did she not read the memo), always the rebel, she shot a video performing one of the newer songs called Different Kind of Love. I like to imagine she was stopped by promoters who caught wind of what she was planning.

 
Here we arrive at the peak of GALA mania, the yo-yo tape measure penis dance move driving the girls wild, leaving gays out of breath (almost as much as she was) and Burtons with no stock left of black t-shirts.

 
As we approach 20 minutes until we redefine what parallel, lines and being alive all mean, I'm going to leave myself with what has became my favourite GALA live. Brought back for a French TV presenter send off, GALA's bold decision to wail live certainly provokes some interesting looks at first, but several iconic cut-to shots later she has the whole studio bumping, jumping and fist pumping. The cumulative choreo of 20+ years is even more intense and crucial than it was back when I first heard it aged 13 in the Ibiza holiday resort I was at having the most unreal time looking at all those hot German men and hearing the chorus of na's that continue to excite and reverberate inside me to this very day.



What a human.
 
OMG I’ve got my strong beliefs

WHAT is this Jose Gonzalez realness up in here? Loved it, and if you have any sense you would delete this thread and enter this in ASFM Valentine’s, and I won’t tell anyone
 
This award winning film maker of films GALA sent nudes to to persuade to do this obviously a fan of the game Snake on the old Nokia then.
 
OMG I’ve got my strong beliefs

WHAT is this Jose Gonzalez realness up in here? Loved it, and if you have any sense you would delete this thread and enter this in ASFM Valentine’s, and I won’t tell anyone

It doesn't fit Kate's bitter brief of bitterness though :)
 
Sales of Lavazza are going to go through the roof as we all fall for GALA's Italian coffee shop gig triumph.
 
Not one to draw a line under the campaign yet, GALA has only went and broke the Mexican internet with her new interview for Rolling Stone Mexico (it's a thing). Sales of rulers and other flat things lines can be made out of have went through the roof.
 

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Just remembering the silly excitement I felt about this, which has spilled over onto Summer Eclipse, which features the Gypsy Kings and was apparently Sophia Loren's favourite song that year (one of these statements isn't true):

 
Jesus, trying to search for a GALA thread is quite difficult for some reason...

Anywway, here she is on an Irish TV show. Absolutely no idea when it aired though.

 
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