Into the Labyrinth (Remastered)

The Artist

Dead Can Dance formed in Melbourne, Australia in 1981 around the duo of Lisa Gerrard and Brendan Perry before relocating to London and signing with the influential 4AD label. Their sound resists easy categorization, weaving Gregorian chant, Middle Eastern modalities, medieval European folk, African percussion, and gothic art-rock into something ceremonial and cinematic. Gerrard's operatic mezzo-soprano, often sung in a self-invented glossolalia, pairs with Perry's baritone croon and deep interest in world folk traditions. By the early 1990s, they had moved beyond their darkwave roots into an increasingly global palette. Into the Labyrinth, released in 1993, sits as their commercial breakthrough and the first album they produced entirely themselves.

The Album

Into the Labyrinth was recorded largely at Quivvy Church, Brendan Perry's converted-chapel studio in County Cavan, Ireland, with the duo self-producing for the first time. Freed from outside guests and collaborators, Gerrard and Perry handled nearly every instrument and vocal themselves, creating an intimate yet vast soundscape. Released on 4AD in September 1993, it became their best-selling record, crossing over to audiences drawn in by the burgeoning world-music moment. Thematically, the album travels: Aboriginal spirit dances, Irish rebel songs, Bertolt Brecht adaptations, and imagined ancient rites all coexist. The result feels like a musical atlas assembled by two obsessive cartographers of the sacred.

Listen For

Invented language as instrument. Lisa Gerrard sings much of her material in idioglossia, a private syllabic tongue. Notice how "Yulunga (Spirit Dance)" and "Ariadne - Remastered" bypass literal meaning entirely in favor of pure emotional signal.

The percussion as landscape. The opener leans heavily on rattles, hand drums, and bell trees that feel more geographic than rhythmic. Listen for how the low end grounds you while the top layer keeps drifting.

Folk-song reinvention. "The Wind That Shakes the Barley - Remastered" is an unaccompanied traditional Irish ballad, sung solo. Note how starkly it sits between two dense, arranged pieces.

Brechtian bite in the closer. "How Fortunate the Man With None" sets Bertolt Brecht's cynical lyric over martial percussion. Track how the arrangement's grandeur amplifies rather than softens the text's dark irony.

Chapel acoustics and space. Recorded in a converted church, many tracks carry natural long reverb tails. Pay attention to the silence around notes, especially on "Ariadne - Remastered" and "Emmeleia - Remastered".