 ead Can Dance
combines elements of European folk music -- particularly music from the Middle Ages and
the Renaissance -- with ambient pop and worldbeat flourishes. Their songs are of lost
beauty, regret and sorrow, inspiration and nobility, and of the everlasting human goal of
attaining a meaningful existence.
Over the course of their career, Dead Can Dance has featured a multitude of members,
but two musicians have remained at the core of the band -- guitarist Brendan Perry and
vocalist Lisa Gerrard. Perry had previously been the lead vocalist and bassist for the
Australian-based punk band the Scavengers, a group who were never able to land a recording
contract. In 1979, the band changed their name to the Marching Girls, but they still
weren't able to sign a contract. The following year, Perry left the group and began
experimenting with electronic music, particularly tape loops and rhythms. In 1981, Perry
formed Dead Can Dance with Lisa Gerrard, Paul Erikson, and Simon Monroe. By 1982, Perry
and Gerrard decided to relocate to London; Erikson and Monroe decided to stay in
Australia.
Within a year, Dead Can Dance had signed a record deal with 4AD. In the spring of 1984,
they released their eponymous debut album, comprised of songs the pair had written in the
previous four years. By the end of the year, the group had contributed two tracks to It'll
End in Tears, the first album by This Mortal Coil, and had released an EP called Garden of
the Arcane Delights. In 1985, Dead Can Dance released their second album, Spleen and
Ideal. The album helped build their European cult following, peaking at number two on the
U.K. indie charts.
For the next two years, Dead Can Dance were relatively quiet, releasing only two new
songs in 1986, both which appeared on the 4AD compilation Lonely Is an Eyesore. Within the
Realm of a Dying Sun, the group's third album, appeared in 1986. In 1988, the band
released their fourth album, The Serpent's Egg and wrote the score for the Agustin
Villarongas film, El Nino de La Luna, which also featured Lisa Gerrard in her acting
debut.
Aion, Dead Can Dance's fifth album, was released in 1990. Also in 1990, the group
toured America for the first time, earning rave reviews. The following year, the group was
involved in various festivals and theatrical productions. In 1992, the compilation A
Passage in Time was released on Rykodisc, making it the first American release of Dead Can
Dance music. Early in 1993, the group provided the score to Baraka and contributed songs
to Sahara Blue. In the fall of 1993, the group released Into the Labyrinth, which became
their first proper studio album to receive an American release. Into the Labyrinth was a
cult success throughout the U.S. and Europe. It was followed by another American and
European tour, which was documented on the 1994 album and film, Toward the Within. In
1995, Lisa Gerrard released her debut solo album, The Mirror Pool. In the summer of 1996,
Dead Can Dance released Spiritchaser and embarked on an international tour.
-- Stephen Thomas Erlewine
& Vladimir Bogdanov
. |
Hollywood's grand old Roosevelt Hotel offers a
cornucopia of Tinsel Town diversions for the visiting tourist: One can study the
architecture in the lobby from the couches, relax with a drink in the Cinegrill to
oftentimes cheesy lounge acts, stroll across the street to admire the famous hand and
footprints at the Chinese Theater or even brave the riff-raff of Hollywood Boulevard to
examine the bronze star of one's favorite celebrity.
One thing, however, that is not encouraged - as a rather rowdy Englishman discovered
one night - is taking a loud, full-bottle-of-tequila-fueled midnight skinny-dip in the
pool. Security guards were called in toute de suite, and the soggy Brit was sent to his
room to dry out.
The hoot of the matter becomes apparent when the aforementioned troublemaker turns out
to be none other than Dead Can Dance's Brendan Perry. You know, the guy with the haunting
baritone who sounds like he probably spends his free time wandering moors in the moonlight
or chanting in darkened churches amidst a circle of candles. Those who know Perry know
better. "I've got a bit of a wild streak," is all he'll admit.
The next afternoon, Perry's other Dead Can Dance half Lisa Gerrard are sitting in the
Roosevelt lobby quietly engaging a cup of hot raspberry tea. All around her, a truckload
of Brits in town for the 4AD/All Virgos Are Mad anniversary celebration mill about. It's
immediately obvious which member of Dead Can Dance spent the evening out reveling.
If Perry embodies the boisterous, untamed aspect of this duo then certainly Gerrard is
its component of tranquillity; though Perry will later insist that "she used to be a
lot wilder; she's just mellowed more than I have over the years." Hers is the angelic
voice that floats, lofts and scales registers effortlessly - somehow never sounding quite
of this earth. She even looks angelic. Strawberry blonde hair - pulled back in a halo-like
black velvet headband - frames a pale face of classic Garbo proportions. Her dress recalls
a choirboy's robe: high-collared, long and flowing. Really, she looks more like she
belongs in a renaissance painting than a hotel swarming with record industry types.
Perry has begged off this portion of the interview in order to recover from the
previous evening's festivities - the culmination of the 4AD/Virgos invasion - and is
presumably upstairs abed with the shades well shut. "It went on all night and sort of
ended with Brendan singing 'Roll Out The Barrel,'" Gerrard chuckles knowingly.
"It's been a rather hectic week."
And Dead Can Dance is accustomed to a somewhat slower pace, at least in terms of their
career. After 12 years, seven albums and a dedicated cult following, their music is
finally managing to creep into the mainstream. It's popped up in a variety of places, some
bizarre (a chase scene in 'Miami Vice,' an Olympic anthem), some quite on target (the
soundtrack of the art film Baraka). Nineteen-ninety-three's Into The Labyrinth not only
netted alternative radio station airplay but topped Billboard's Heatseekers chart the
second week of its release - an odd position for an album that draws on Gregorian chants
and Middle Eastern dance. Their latest offering Toward The Within (a live record with
several new tracks) is already charting in the alternative lists.
So in a time continuum replete with grunge rock, riot grrrls and the resurgence of
punk, is the world ready for a little ancient music? Apparently, increasingly so: A group
of Benedictine Monks even managed to break into the charts, and its success inspired the
recent release of Abbess Hildegard Von Bingen's works. Contemporary artists have toyed
with elements of the ancient - from Led Zeppelin and their visions of Valhalla to Enigma's
dance explorations of the Gregorian Chant - but nobody's had the balls to make it the
cornerstone of their musical repertoire like Dead Can Dance.
"I'm not a sociologist but I think people are being forced to look deeper at other
areas of their own existence to try to find a way of maintaining balance outside of
material things. And music is the thing that nourishes the soul," explains Gerrard.
"I think people are finding now with world music and ancient music that there is a
lot of power there that's waking up things inside them that they didn't know were there
before. But unfortunately, we are not prudent with the way we listen. Music is like
wallpaper now; people don't listen."
Much like the character of Dead Can Dance's sonic influences, Gerrard's ideas about
music and its creation tend toward the spiritual or at least holistic side. If
contemporary pop/rock is about "self" and the purging and laying bare of the
artist's soul, Dead Can Dance view the creation process as something more divine and
entirely less personal. Musical inspiration, according to Gerrard, is a gift and for said
gift one must serve as a vessel - "a medium for which the work to pass through."
The artist initially shapes and molds the creation, but ultimately must set it free.
"I think when somebody uses music as therapy, it's useful for that, but I find by
listening to it I feel like I'm a voyeur. People are very voyeuristic but you don't
realize how dangerous this is the artist," insists Gerrard. "They're pouring out
their soul just to get some disgusting backlash from the press two years down the road,
and they completely destroy that person. Maybe it's been good therapy for the artist but
then they've got nothing left and nobody wants anything from them. I think you really need
to take all of that out before you give your work to the public. You've got to be sure
that what you're doing is something to nourish, to move away from the immediate things,
the immediate psychosis."
Unsurprisingly, Dead Can Dance has managed to stay well out of the media's
image-defining spotlight, preferring to have listeners focus on the music, not their
personal lives. But a slight loosening of this custom is in evidence with the release of
the Toward The Within long-form video that accompanies the album. Director Mark Magdison
(who'd previously used the duo's music in his Baraka) documented an invitation-only
concert last year in addition to shooting intimate Q&A format interview footage of the
pair. For the first time, fans can not only see live performances captured on celluloid
but a glimpse inside two people who, up until now, have remained something of an enigma.
Gerrard confesses initial trepidation about the idea of cameras during a show while
Perry, on the other hand, was pretty much nonplused. "Look, I perform with my eyes
closed because I find that aids in my concentration," he laughs. "Plus, we can
barely see the first row of the audience because of the lights, much less the cameras. So
for me it really wasn't a problem."
Brendan Perry is the product of a not entirely unpredictable English upbringing. As a
kid in London, he'd wait till his parents were out and his brothers and sisters in bed and
then crank up the West Side Story soundtrack, singing along while enacting the scenes.
Life got slightly hipper in the Sixties, thanks to a rather swinging, nightclub croupier
auntie with a single-buying fetish. The young Perry would plop a thick stack of her 45s on
the turntable, strap on his John, Paul, George and Ringo toy guitar and airjam to
everything from Motown to early Mersey Beat to Presley to the Dave Clarke Five.
"Music was always a very visual experience for me," chuckles Perry, who's
phoning his insight from back home in Ireland. "It was always a physical, visionary
experience where I'd imagine myself in certain situations with the music. It wasn't a
superficial thing for just listening pleasure."
At ten, Perry started amassing classical discs and soundtracks ("I don't know
why," he muses, "probably because they were cheap: only a couple of bob down in
the market stalls"). By 14 he had exchanged his Beatles plaything for a real guitar
and taught himself to play on a sixweek ocean crossing when he and his family relocated to
New Zealand.
Meanwhile, over in Australia, a young Lisa Gerrard was feeding off the exotic music
that lofted from the windows of her Greek/Turkish immigrant neighborhood. "It was a
pretty crummy area but certainly a paradise musically," she recalls. "I remember
walking around the streets as a child and hearing these beautiful arabesque voices just
oozing out of the buildings, and I know that's influenced me. There's too much of that in
my work, and it's been there from the beginning. When I was 13 playing the piano, I was
playing arabesque sounding things."
Unsurprisingly, her record collection consisted not of Beatles and Stones albums but
Arabic, Greek and Turkish discs she'd find at local opportunity shops, the occasional Roxy
Music and Pink Floyd selection serving as the only "modern" factor. Punk rock
came along, and while it may not have been kindred folk sonically, it's DIY spirit
appealed to Gerrard. So at 17, she took her avant-garde works and an accordion to some of
Melbourne's rougher pubs, where she wasn't too terribly well-received by the local
denizen. "They'd just scream for me to get off the stage," she laughs.
It was about this time that Gerrard met Perry, who was singing and playing bass in a
fairly conventional band called the Marching Girls "and wasn't at all sure about what
I was trying to do," he says.
"When I first met her, I wasn't sure about getting involved with her - she's a
pretty forthright woman. She doesn't pull punches, and she wasn't averse to giving a man a
good slapping from time to time if he needed it."
The two became romantically involved and then eventually began to collaborate
musically. After two years of washing dishes in Melbourne restaurants, they saved up
enough money to move to London, where they were signed by 4AD and , in 1984, released
their first record: Dean Can Dance. A rather goth-like effort, their debut was
misinterpreted by many as somewhat morbid, but it nonetheless set the stage for future
works: 1985's Spleen And Ideal, '86's Within The Realm Of A Dying Sun, '88's The Serpent's
Egg, '90's Aion, '92's A Passage In Time (a best of collection with two new songs) and
finally '93's Into The Labyrinth.
"I sort of see Dead Can Dance's music as interpretations of influences of
classical, world and ethnic music made more accessible to some extent to us
Westerners," explains director Magdison, who's now joined Lisa at the Roosevelt for
tea. "One thing that I responded to in their music is the almost primordial essence
to things that people respond to on an unconscious level. It's not an electoral kind of
thing but when you touch it you get a very powerful response."
As Dead Can Dance plodded toward global recognition, the relationship between Gerrard and
Perry changed. "We found that something had to go because we were lovers for a number
of years and were making music - we were basically living each other's dream worlds, too -
and we lost focus of each other," explains Perry. "It was the music or our
physical relationship, so we opted for the music - we felt that was probably more
important to us. It was painful to go through. In retrospect, I think we chose
wisely."
Today the duo has reached a point where they can live - quite literally - on opposite
ends of the earth (Gerrard, now a mother of two, resides in the rural Snow River Mountains
of Australia, Perry in a restored 19th Century church in rural Ireland) and make Dead Can
Dance work. Both toil in their own studios, creating the seeds of future Dead Can Dance
compositions that are allowed to fully blossom when the two actually meet and record.
"We've always pretty much written independently of one another," says Gerrard,
"so it's not as unusual as it sounds."
Increasingly, the two have also pursued endeavors outside the group. Gerrard, in
addition to just recording with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, scored the Temenos
production of Oedipus Rex in Ireland. Both she and Perry contributed to Hector Zazou's
Sahara Blue album and scored Agustin Villarongas' film El Nino De La Luna (in which
Gerrard also made her acting debut). It is by seeing the two perform on their own that one
becomes acutely aware of just how much of a "cocktail," as Perry puts it, Dead
Can Dance really is. For Gerrard's Los Angeles All Virgos Are Mad show at McCabe's, it's
almost a classical approach. The crowd is seated and reverent - awed even - as Gerrard
wordlessly, noiselessly take the stage. The theater is completely dark, save for the
spotlight beamed onto the dais where Gerrard, clad in a flowing white gown, and her
assemblage of musicians wend their way through soaring liturgical-like creations. She
doesn't speak between songs, and the audience, in response, claps quietly.
Smash cut to Perry at the LA rock club the Troubadour, and it's a slightly more raucous
affair. People pound beers while Perry, with only one other musician for accompaniment,
runs through a slew of songs to the boisterous appreciation of the crowd. That hallmark
baritone is ever-present, but the sound and feeling of the music are centuries removed
from his work with Gerrard.
"Performing on my own is far more relaxing than a Dead Can Dance show," he
readily admits.
The marked differences between the two performers solo may sound an alert fans. But far
from heralding the demise of Dead Can Dance for two solo careers, it only serves as a
catalyst for when they work together. "We had a big dream [with Dead Can Dance] and
it's starting to make sense now. I mean, we only started making money [as musicians] five
years ago. Brendan and I are very, very close friends. I don't even want to know what life
would be like if Brendan weren't around somewhere," Gerrard exclaims in earnest.
"I mean, who would I ask whether something was crap or not?"
Brendan recalls some of the ways they prepared for shows back then. "She would run
around the block and be all out of breath before a show, but would swear it clears the
lungs so you could really sing strongly." Lisa looks a bit embarrassed. "What a
nutcase," she laughs. "I discovered that from running home after school really
fast. I always sounded better after running home."
Sean Bowley of the band Eden has admired Brendan and Lisa's work since his own band
started up around 1980 in the same Melbourne scene that spawned other notable bands like
Nick Cave's Birthday Party. "There was a very creative musical community and
diversity of bands in Melbourne from 1980 to 1983 that seems to be called the 'little
bands,'" Bowley explains. "That's what the film Dogs in Space refers to but it's
an inaccurate description. They all played at the Crystal Ballroom.
"There was a real emphasis on using common instruments in unusual ways. Dead Can
Dance were much more aggressive back then, but not in a punk context, it was more in a Joy
Division context. They had a really driving rhythm section that made it in some ways to
their first album."
"When you listen to our albums, there's a natural progression," points out
Brendan. "A metamorphosis. The difference between the first and second album is
immense. That was a large stretch because we had basically been with guitar, bass and
drums. Through the years, we started choosing sounds that couldn't be expressed through
those instruments. We were streamlining our sound, in a way, but also choosing more
palates. We also had access to more tonalities. We really needed that."
"I think everyone on any musical level needs that to explore for a natural
evolution, Lisa adds.
"It's a vehicle," Brendan continues, "whether it be in Arabic or
medieval form, that expresses what we are."
Lisa and Brendan's strong sense of what they wanted for their band caused them to
change the entire make-up and contributions of other members early on. It was apparently
this form of tight control that Lisa and Brendan wanted that caused Paul Erikson to leave
the band in 1983 and fly back to Australia. "Initially we had intended to be a group
where people were co-writing and inputing ideas," says Brendan. "They could use
Dead Can Dance as a catalyst for their creativity. But as we progressed it just became
apparent to Lisa and I that the kind of music we were writing was unique and the others
weren't in the same vein. So we decided, as our writing capabilities grew stronger, there
wasn't any point in maintaining this ideal of a group-writing situation."
4AD's Ivo believes that Brendan and Lisa's strong sense of control and self belief has
propelled the band to where they are now. "They've been the most consistent of all
the people I've ever worked with in their attitude and motivation. They've absolutely
stuck to their guns. They've learned to follow their own instincts and, as far as
Brendan's concerned, learned how to create the sounds that he wanted himself to become an
extraordinary producer. They're role models for the way things can be done in this
industry if you're talented and your motivation is music as opposed to success, money.
They're truly self-sufficient. They make records at their own pace and the kind of records
they want to make with no interference of direction from the record company. We've banged
heads a couple of times, but ultimately, they've always been right for Dead Can Dance and
I respect them for that."
An old rusty truck rattles up the path outside the church. A man in thigh-high
Wellington boots gets out. It's another local, this time peddling coal. His two friends
wait in the truck, blasting traditional Celtic folk on the beater's old stock radio. As
Lisa leaves the door open to make the exchange, the Egyptian music playing inside the
church intermingles with the Celtic sound outside.
"I don't know how you can call us Gothy," Lisa says in a slightly peeved
tone, while discussing allegations that Dead Can Dance pioneered the Goth style, laying
the groundwork for megagloom bands like Sisters of Mercy and the Mission. "If you
look at us, we predate Gothic music anyway. Out music has evolved in so many different
areas, how could you think it possibly fits in one genre. That has always been the problem
in getting airplay, that you can't capsulize what we do. It's a very lazy description that
was picked up on from one album and it's stuck."
Sam Rosenthal is owner of Projekt Records in Los Angels, a label the describes as
"gothic ambient." Projekt bands include Lycia, Thantos, Alio Die, and
Rosenthal's own group, Black Tape for a Blue Girl. Although he claims he's not heavily
influenced by their sound, he holds a great deal of respect for Dead Can Dance. "A
person's comments that Dead Can Dance are gloomy are based upon how that music makes them
feel. I find Dead Can Dance very uplifting and enlightening. 'Morose' isn't the adjective
I'd use at all. The band stir scarry emotions because their music makes you think. Most
people don't like to think, so when they do, they're often not happy. Their life isn't as
glorious as they would hope."
In order to understand something that's foreign or new, people often have to either peg
it into some already existing category or realm, or tear it down and destroy it. "No
one really understood what it was we were trying to achieve," Lisa says. "They
thought Brendan was a lunatic because he was doing five-hour soundchecks. We were trying
to do something that had a standard and quality that we had set. It wasn't about money and
being onstage, it was about creating something that was poetic and absolute. We must be
totally convinced by the work and, by being totally convinced, we've carried on. We want
to take people outside the mundane, the void of existence that has been created for us so
far by ourselves."
"The music brings us into another state," Brendan continues. "Music is
an escape that sometimes plays on emotional tensions, but is a release at the same time.
It's surrealism, which is a higher sense of realism."
"Our music brings us beyond being just human beings that eat and shit and watch
TV," Lisa adds. "We can do something great that brings us in contact with the
earth, each other and ourselves."
Dead Can Dance were flat out broke for the first half of their career. It wasn't until
the late '80s, when the two split up--Lisa moving to Spain and Brendan to Ireland--that
they began making royalties. The band's last album Aion sold over 75,000 copies. "in
the beginning, we were living on twelve pounds a week. All the money we earned, if any,
was put right back into the band by buying instruments," recalls Brendan. "As
long as we got a pint in on the weekend. But we started living off our music five years
ago, then making a little in the past four. You know, compilations, soft drink ads,"
he jokes, "also films, documentaries."
"Their music doesn't have a limited appeal," says Projekt's Sam Rosenthal,
explaining why Dead Can Dance's popularity has increased. "it carries across more
than a guitar-based alternative band. They reach a wide range of people and you don't have
to be into one kind of music. Anyone from 14 to 49 can feel it--maybe for different
reasons but not many people who listen to classical would care about Nirvana. New agers,
classical fans, world music and goth fans would probably like Dead Can Dance if they gave
it a shot."
In the most recent edition of The Trouser Press Record Guide, a reference book to
alternative and underground music, you'll find Dead Can Dance sandwiched between the Dead
Boys and the Dead Kennedys. The band's entry, written by David Sherida, the entry
describes Dead Can Dance's sound as "all-too-precious"; other critics have
described the band as outright pretentious.
"We all pretend," responds Lisa. "It's through pretending that we arrive
at something. I don't think being pretentious is a negative thing. We should all be
allowed. But as a description, it's a very lazy way of saying 'I don't understand.' Isn't
part of the challenge trying to understand the nuance of the words and music?"
But Gerrard herself has been characterized in interviews as haughty even to the point
of being absolutely loopy. As a result, she stopped doing interviews entirely for a good
five years. "When I was reading these articles, I was thinking, 'You're only telling
me about you. You're not telling me about something that's outside of everyday life or
something that's inspired you. You're telling me how cynical you are.' I'm not prepared to
get ripped to shreds while Brendan seems much more capable of saying the right
things." He laughs and says, "That's us. Mr. Logic and Miss Flyaway."
As the sun goes down, the farms and green knolls seem to totally disappear in a
countryside void of street lamps. The waning light casts weird shadows across the church.
For the first time today, Brendan and Lisa are looking comfortable around one another.
"When you're working and in a relationship with someone," says Lisa, "it
can be really hurtful. When things get tough, you can't walk away and go home. It breaks
down after awhile and it's a pity. When we split up we decided we wouldn't work together
again but the music was so strong. We threatened each other about not ever working
together again, 'This is it! I never want to see you again!'
"It's our mutual passion for music that keeps us together," says Brendan,
"keeps us alive."
Erin Culley, Raygun |
Dead
Can Dance 
