''The Serpent's Egg'' is the fourth studio album by the Australian band

Dead Can Dance Dead Can Dance are a British-Australian band founded in Melbourne in 1981 by Brendan Perry and Lisa Gerrard, before relocating to London the following year. The Australian music historian Ian McFarlane described Dead Can Dance's style as "const ...

, released on 24 October 1988 by record label

4AD 4AD is a British record label owned by Beggars Group. It was founded in London under the name Axis Records by Ivo Watts-Russell and Peter Kent in 1980 as an imprint of Beggars Banquet Records. The name was changed to 4AD after the release of th ...

Background

The album was the last produced while

Brendan Perry Brendan Michael Perry (born 30 June 1959) is a British singer and multi-instrumentalist best known for his work as half of the duo Dead Can Dance with Lisa Gerrard. Early life Perry was born in Whitechapel, London, England, UK, in 1959 to a mot ...

and Lisa Gerrard were a romantic couple. A majority of the album was recorded in a multi-storey apartment block in the

Isle of Dogs The Isle of Dogs is a large peninsula bounded on three sides by a large meander in the River Thames in East London, England. It includes the Cubitt Town, Millwall and Canary Wharf districts. The area was historically part of the Manor, Haml ...

, London. Perry discussed the album's title: "In a lot of aerial photographs of the Earth, if you look upon it as a giant organism—a macrocosmos—you can see that the nature of the life force, water, travels in a serpentine way".

Track listing

Reception

In a retrospective review,

AllMusic AllMusic (previously known as All-Music Guide and AMG) is an American online database, online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on Musical artist, musicians and Mus ...

said, "Perry and Gerrard continued to experiment and improve with ''The Serpent's Egg'', as much a leap forward as ''

Spleen and Ideal ''Spleen and Ideal'' is the second studio album by Australian band Dead Can Dance. It was released on 25 November 1985 by 4AD. The album spearheaded the group's sonic transition from their post-punk and gothic rock-influenced roots towards a ne ...

'' was some years previously", heaping particular praise on the album opener "The Host of Seraphim", which it called "so jaw-droppingly good that almost the only reaction is sheer awe".

Legacy

* Electronic music duo

The Chemical Brothers The Chemical Brothers are an English electronic music duo formed by Ed Simons and Tom Rowlands in Manchester in 1992. They were pioneers in bringing the big beat genre to the forefront of pop culture. Originally known as The Dust Brothers, th ...

used a reversed sample of "Song of Sophia" in " Song to the Siren" in 1992, later also included on the album '' Exit Planet Dust'' in 1995. * Orkidea sampled "The Host of Seraphim" in his 1999 single "Unity". * Rapper

G Herbo Herbert Randall Wright III (born October 8, 1995), better known by his stage name G Herbo (formerly Lil Herb), is an American rapper. He signed with the Chicago-based record label Machine Entertainment Group in 2011, at the age of 16. His debut ...

sampled "The Host of Seraphim" on his song "4 Minutes of Hell, Part 3" from his debut mixtape, '' Welcome to Fazoland''. *

Experimental An experiment is a procedure carried out to support or refute a hypothesis, or determine the efficacy or likelihood of something previously untried. Experiments provide insight into cause-and-effect by demonstrating what outcome occurs whe ...

act

Ulver Ulver (Norwegian for "wolves") is a Norwegian Experimental electronic music, experimental electronica band founded in 1993, by vocalist Kristoffer Rygg. Their early works, such as debut album ''Bergtatt – Et eeventyr i 5 capitler, Bergtatt'', ...

covered "In the Kingdom of the Blind the One-Eyed Are Kings" for the Dead Can Dance tribute album ''Tribute to Dead Can Dance: The Lotus Eaters'', released in 2004. * French rapper

Keny Arkana Victoire Monnier (born December 20, 1982, in Boulogne-Billancourt), professionally known by her stage name Keny Arkana, is an Argentine- French rapper who is active in the alter-globalization and civil disobedience movements. In 2004 she founded ...

sampled "The Host Of Seraphim" on her song "Je Passe Le Salut", from her album "L'Esquisse Vol. 2" released in 2011. * "In the Kingdom of the Blind the One-Eyed Are Kings" was also covered by

death metal Death metal is an extreme metal, extreme subgenre of heavy metal music. It typically employs heavily distorted and low-tuned guitars, played with techniques such as palm muting and tremolo picking; deep death growl, growling vocals; aggressive ...

act Cattle Decapitation as a bonus track on their 2019 album '' Death Atlas''.

In popular culture

"The Host of Seraphim" was featured in the 1992 non-narrative

documentary film A documentary film (often described simply as a documentary) is a nonfiction Film, motion picture intended to "document reality, primarily for instruction, education or maintaining a Recorded history, historical record". The American author and ...

Baraka Baraka or Barakah may refer to: * Berakhah or Baraka, in Judaism, a blessing usually recited during a ceremony * Barakah or Baraka, in Islam, the beneficent force from God that flows through the physical and spiritual spheres * Baraka, full ''ḥa ...

'' (and was included in the film's

soundtrack A soundtrack is a recorded audio signal accompanying and synchronised to the images of a book, drama, motion picture, radio program, television show, television program, or video game; colloquially, a commercially released soundtrack album of m ...

), the theatrical trailers for the 2003 film '' Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines'' and the 2006 film '' Home of the Brave'', in the final scenes of the 2007 film '' The Mist'', the fire scene of the 2010 film '' Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole'', ''

How to Get Away with Murder ''How to Get Away with Murder'' is an American legal drama thriller television series that premiered on the American Broadcasting Company (ABC) on September 25, 2014, and concluded on May 14, 2020. The series was created by Peter Nowalk and pro ...

'' (season 3, episode 15 and season 6, episode 9), in the 2018 film '' Lords of Chaos'', and the 2002 film '' Ripley's Game'' starring

John Malkovich John Gavin Malkovich (born December 9, 1953) is an American actor. He is the recipient of several accolades, including a Primetime Emmy Award, in addition to nominations for two Academy Awards, a BAFTA Award, two Screen Actors Guild Awards, and ...

. A short excerpt of "Ullyses" was also used as background music in the BBC Horizon episode #30.7 "Hunt For The Doomsday Asteroid" in February 1994, originally broadcast ahead of the predicted impact of Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 with the planet

Jupiter Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun and the List of Solar System objects by size, largest in the Solar System. It is a gas giant with a Jupiter mass, mass more than 2.5 times that of all the other planets in the Solar System combined a ...

in July that same year. "Severance" was used in the "Victims of Circumstance" episode of ''

Miami Vice ''Miami Vice'' is an American crime drama television series created by Anthony Yerkovich and produced by Michael Mann for NBC. The series stars Don Johnson as James "Sonny" Crockett and Philip Michael Thomas as Ricardo Tubbs, Ricardo "Rico" Tub ...

''.

Release history

Personnel

* Lisa Gerrard – vocals, production on tracks 3–6, 8 and 9 *

– vocals,

hurdy-gurdy The hurdy-gurdy is a string instrument that produces sound by a hand-turned crank, rosined wheel rubbing against the strings. The wheel functions much like a violin (or nyckelharpa) bow, and single notes played on the instrument sound similar ...

, production, sleeve design * Andrew Beesley – viola * Sarah Buckley – viola * Tony Gamage – cello * Alison Harling – violin * Rebecca Jackson – violin * David Navarro Sust – vocals ; Technical * John A. Rivers – co-production on tracks 1, 2, 7 and 10 *

Vaughan Oliver Vaughan Oliver (12 September 1957 – 29 December 2019) was a British graphic designer based in Epsom, Surrey. Oliver was best known for his work with graphic design studios 23 Envelope and v23. Both studios maintained a close relationship wit ...

– sleeve design (with Brendan Perry)

References

External links

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Serpent's Egg, The 1988 albums Dead Can Dance albums 4AD albums Albums produced by John A. Rivers