An Illusion Shattered...

[endlessrarities]

Today, I grappled with the thorny issue of the Scottish Bronze Age.  I've finally got back to writing up my paper on the Bronze Age multiple urned cremation burial, but the more research I do on cist burials and urn depositions in Scotland, the more questions I end up with.

I'm one of these people who has a soundtrack to almost everything they do - my chosen soundtrack for most matters relating to the Early and Middle Bronze Ages is Spiritchaser by Dead Can Dance, and in particular, the track Song of The Stars.

I'm a big fan of Dead Can Dance.  I was first introduced to their music nine years ago, when I was part of an excavation team working on a Bronze Age burial cairn in the east of Scotland.  The senior archaeologist on the project drove a bunch of us home each night, and he had a varied selection of tapes to speed us on our way.  Most of these weren't to my liking at all.  {House of Pain?  No thank you!!)  But one which really stood out was a compilation from Dead Can Dance. 

When I first heard the opening track, my ears pricked up.  I can't remember the track, but it was Lisa Gerrard on vocals sounding exotic and mysterious and other-wordly.  The next track was Salterello, which as scholars of the medieval period will know, is a medieval dance.

"What's the music?" I asked.

"Dead Can Dance," I was told.

Now, since my colleague had pagan inclinations, I thought he was just coming out with a rather profound comment relating perhaps to the Neolithic/Bronze Age or the process of archaeological excavation, or the interpretation of past lives by those living in the present. Then it dawned on me that he was in fact talking about the music, and as the CD played on, I  was hooked.

In the intervening years, I've tracked down every album (except the compilation!) and I often use the music for inspiration, whether I'm writing archaeological pieces or historical fiction (particularly my medieval Scots stuff).  If you're not familiar with the band yourself, then you may know Lisa Gerrard's more recent material, in particular the soundtrack for Gladiator. 

With a name like Dead Can Dance, I thought these guys would look like archetypal Goths.  I envisaged Lisa Gerrard as having a long, wild mane of brown or black hair and a penchant for full dresses in black or dark wine red.  As for Brendan Parry...  Again, I assumed he'd have long wavy hair, pale skin, perhaps a black brimmed hat and a velvet jacket with a cravat and tight jeans.  Sort of like the Vampire Lestat meets Jim Morrison...

Wrong!!!!  When my poor husband was relieved from cookery detail last night, he spent his new-found leisure time looking up Dead Can Dance videos on You Tube (yes, he's become a fan, too!!)  He was so amazed by what he saw that he summoned me to take a look.  Lisa Gerrard was oddly reminiscent of a librarian: a neat small figure with an austere blond bun, who wore a white or pale grey dress.  And Brendan Parry looked like an off-duty accountant.  Black shirt and trousers, greying black hair and beard cropped really short.  They seemed more like Anti-Goths!!

Seriously, if you're a fan of medieval or eastern European music and you haven't yet dabbled with Dead Can Dance, do give them ago.  They're well worth investigating.  If you find them half as inspirational as I've done, you won't regret it!

Comments

[faerie-writer.livejournal.com]

Oh, endlessrarities, I LOVE you! I'm always looking for new writing music that stirs the soul, and, oh, the Dead Can Dance are just PERFECT for what I'm working on now, particularly the Toward the Within album! In my story, my gypsy/angel girl has come from the Venetian-held Greek seaport of Modon and is now residing at Lake Avernus (near Naples) where the gypsy tribe's drabardi uses the legend of the Cumaean Sibyl to drum up fortune-telling business with the locals. My gypsy/angel girl sort of begins to channel the sibyl (or at least she thinks she does) and the track Song of the Sibyl is absolutely the PERFECT mood music to write this scene to (which I am currently working on). Actually, the *whole* album is excellent! I just downloaded it from Puretracks! :D

[endlessrarities.livejournal.com]

Glad to oblige!!

I'm not familiar with Toward the Within, which is a bit of an admission. I wonder if it's one of the compilations??

I know Song of the Sibyl - it's on the album Aion, which is one of my personal favourites. I listened to Aion almost incessantly when I was writing my late medieval novels. The song Black Sun became one of the anthems for my anti-hero!

I really love the track Ulysses, too, which is on Serpent's Egg. I always play it very loudly on Hallowe'en, to frighten away the local kids from the door (heh, heh). It sounds like a Vampyre Waltz...

[treenahasthaal.livejournal.com]

So do you think I'd like them? : )

Yup, I'm alive - sort off. : )

[endlessrarities.livejournal.com]

Very glad to hear from you! I was concerned (though I guessed you'd be having issues....).

Um, I'm not sure if you'd like them or not.

One question:

1) Do you like the soundtrack to Gladiator?

If the answer is 'yes', then you'd like them.

Brendan Parry may look like an accountant, but IMO he's got one of the sexiest voices around (my top three, in case you're wondering, are Jim Morrison, David Gahan and Brendan Parry, in no particular order).

If you're writing anything alien, strange or unearthly, it might just do the trick. I use the albums Aion; Spleen and Ideal and Dead Can Dance for writing medieval stuff, but if venturing into prehistory (Late Neo/Early Bronze Age in particular), it has to be Spiritchaser or Serpent's Egg. Into the Labyrinth is something I listen to, but for some odd reason I've never written to it!

Incidentally, I always play Song of the Stars from Spiritchaser when I lose a loved one (human or animal). It's my symbolic way of speeding my loved one on into the realms of the Ancestors... I might have quoted you some of the lyrics when you lost poor Diva, or maybe I held back because I was worried I'd upset you...

We also had The Spider's Strategem played at our wedding when the register was being signed. I'm sure my husband will say that it was an appropriate choice...

Check them out on You Tube and see what you think. Try The Ubiquitous Mr Lovegrove, if you can...

[treenahasthaal.livejournal.com]

No. No issues as such. Just life! : ) Sometimes I feel like I don't have a minute to myself. But I'm still here. : )

I did read Lysander's last installment and thought it fab. The love scene worked very well. But if, I'm honest I prefer talking in person about these things! : ) We really should try and get together, but Ive always got the boys!

Also, I have been writing myself again albeit in fits and starts and when I have the time. Fanfic.... but I'm stll writing.

I'll have to try out Dead Can Dance... Although I've been listening to Green Day lately!

[endlessrarities.livejournal.com]

I'm really pleased to hear that your muse has not deserted you!

Yes, we must meet up...

You should come around for dinner some time, if you can persuade some nice folks to babysit...

I'm not doing as well with my writing as I should be. I keep blogging instead and I feel like I've run out of momentum a bit. I'm plugging away at the editing and it's steadily taking shape, but I haven't re-written the stuff I lost in the Great Memory Stick Failure of 2009...

[bellakara.livejournal.com]

Listening to Dead Can Dance at You Tube just now. Weird that I had a dream about their name the other week though because I'd never heard their music. However they are very good. Will certainly look out for more of their stuff.

[endlessrarities.livejournal.com]

Excellent!!

I'm sure you will enjoy it.

[medievalmuse.livejournal.com]

I love Dead Can Dance and kick myself that I didn't travel far and wide to see them in concert a few years back. Lisa Gerrard is an ethereal goddess!

[endlessrarities.livejournal.com]

I'd love to have seen them.

They seem to have been a very rare beast - a band that could pull off as good a performace in the concert hall as they could in the recording studio.

I believe there is a Dead Can Dance tribute band doing the rounds, which is a bit of a bizarre concept...

[medievalmuse.livejournal.com]

I have one of those tribute cds and it is quite good too.