Australian musical project Dead Can Dance was formed in 1981 by Lisa Gerrard and Brendan Perry in Melbourne, later relocating to London in May 1982. Music historian Ian McFarlane described Dead Can Dance's style as 'constructed soundscapes of mesmerising grandeur and solemn beauty, African polyrhythms, Gaelic folk, Gregorian chant, Middle Eastern mantras and art rock'.

The uncompromising eponymous debut, Dead Can Dance (1984), harnessed a bewitching barrage of sounds (including the distinct sound of the yangqin) with the then five-piece interchanging instruments to leave the vocals of Lisa Gerrard and Brendan Perry as the only constant.

The album’s cover was important as an introduction too, a Papua New Guinean mask that some believe when worn, a life force can be put into the inanimate wood - the dead can dance.

Formed in Australia in the early 80s by Lisa Gerrard and Brendan Perry, Dead Can Dance had veered away from the punk explosion towards a more non-conformist style. But finding the music scene unreceptive they moved to London, landed a record deal with 4AD and embarked on a career with the label that would last seventeen years.

Highly respected artists with a loyal global fanbase, Gerrard and Perry consistently made music full of integrity and passion. Both immensely talented vocalists - Gerrard with her inimitable, mesmeric style and Perry’s haunting baritone - they were also gifted, instinctive musicians and their melding of traditional instruments with samplers created a bridge between ancient and modern music.

"Early punk backgrounds and the like behind them, Perry and Gerrard created a striking, dour landmark in early-'80s atmospherics on their first, self-titled effort. Bearing much more resemblance to the similarly gripping, dark early work of bands like the Cocteau Twins and the Cure than to the later fusions of music that would come to characterize the duo's sound, Dead Can Dance is as goth as it gets in many places. Perry and Gerrard's wonderful vocal work -- his rich, warm tones and her unearthly, multi-octave exaltations -- are already fairly well established, but serve different purposes here. Thick, shimmering guitar and rumbling bass/drum/drum machine patterns practically scream their sonic connections to the likes of Robin Guthrie and Robert Smith, but they still sound pretty darn good for all that. When they stretch that sound to try for a more distinct, unique result, the results are astonishing. Gerrard is the major beneficiary here -- "Frontier" explicitly experiments with tribal percussion, resulting in an excellent combination of her singing and the rushed music. Then there's the astonishing "Ocean," where guitar and chiming bells and other rhythmic sounds provide the bed for one of her trademark -- and quite, quite lovely -- vocal excursions into the realm of glossolalia. Perry in contrast tends to be matched with the more straightforward numbers of digital processing and thick, moody guitar surge. The album ends on a fantastic high note -- "Musica Eternal," featuring a slowly increasing-in-volume combination of hammered dulcimer, low bass tones, and Gerrard's soaring vocals. As an indicator of where the band was going, it's perfect." - Ned Raggett, All Music

Track Listing:

01. The Fatal Impact
02. The Trial
03. Frontier
04. Fortune
05. Ocean
06. East of Eden
07. Threshold
08. A Passage In Time
09. Wild In the Woods
10. Musica Eterna

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