Country: Australia / UK
Dead Can Dance released the follow up album to their masterpiece Within the Realm of a Dying Sun (1987) on 24 October, 1988. The result proved that some recording artists don't have only one peak album but two: The Serpent's Egg doesn't really pale in comparison with its already stunning predecessor. Last year's album failed to win Best album of the year because there was one unbeatable competitor. This one wins, even though once again there is one extremely strong competitor.
The Serpent's Egg boasts one of the best opening tracks ever. The Host of Seraphim is one of the greatest achievements in music history: it runs a little over six minutes but you don't really want it to end at all. Like I already mentioned in the previous blog entry, it is my number one short song of the entire decade. Some four years after its release, filmmaker Ron Fricke used it in his film Baraka (1992) and that is where the film clip below is from. Much later, Frank Darabont also used the song to great effect while leading up to the bleak ending of his mainstream horror film The Mist (2007).
Following this, nothing really feels like anything but Dead Can Dance still manage to create an excellent album. None of the rest of the songs are quite as great as the opening but many of them are still great. There seems to be an even more clearcut division between Lisa Gerrard's mostly ethnic songs and Brendan Perry's more easily accessible art rock. Even though the opening track is Gerrard's tour de force, it is actually Perry whose songs are more memorable on the rest of the album.
Following the short Orbis de Ignis, again sung by Gerrard, there follows a succession of three excellent songs that, together with the opening, are more than enough to ensure The Serpent's Egg a place among the ranks of all time greats. Perry begins his singing duties with the absolutely beautiful Severance which is then followed by a further two classic songs The Writing on My Father's Hand and In the Kingdom of the Blind the One-Eyed Are Kings.
The first one of the two songs following Severance is again Gerrard's, but unlike most of the others she has written this time, there aren't too many ethnic influences on it. The Writing on My Father's Hand sounds like one of Perry's songs which is one reason why it fits so perfectly in between the two that actually are his. Instrumentation is very sparse. The duo relies on beautiful melody and the singer's voice which are backed up with only very few instruments. Kingdom of the Blind is vintage Perry; a very beautiful song.
This is where A side of the vinyl version ends. B side opens with a number of Gerrard's less accessible explorations on how to make Eastern and Western music meet on an art rock album somewhere between the opposite ends and more likely closer to the Eastern end. The results are very good and genuinely interesting, but in my opinion do not reach the same level of greatness as the rest of the album.
Finally, it is then time for Perry to provide The Serpent's Egg with its last masterpiece and second best track. The almost unbearably lovely closing track Ulysses is not only the best Perry song on the album - and that is quite a feat considering the greatness of the others - but perhaps also the best he ever wrote; assuming that singing duties in the group befell the individual who had written the material or at least been more heavily involved with it.
The Serpent's Egg was the last album Dead Can Dance published while Gerrard and Perry were still a couple. Following the end of their romantic relationship, their professional co-operation under the Dead Can Dance banner continued, but some creative spark seemed to be missing from their following recordings. Their next full length album, out in 1990, was still quite good but not as good as the previous three, and from that point onward new releases became progressively weaker.
So, the best album and short song have already been found. For a second year in a row, I was unable to choose anything in the over 12 minutes category, so Dead Can Dance remains as the only winner this year. Here is our annual summary of the very best both this year and since 1967.
ALBUMS OF THE YEAR:
Clannad: Atlantic Realm
Dead Can Dance: The Serpent's Egg
Talk Talk: Spirit of Eden
UNMISSABLE TRACKS OF THE YEAR:
All About Eve: Martha's Harbour
Bangles: Something to Believe in
Brian Eno: Saint Tom
Dead Can Dance: The Host of Seraphim
Dead Can Dance: In the Kingdom of the Blind the One-Eyed Are Kings
Dead Can Dance: Severance
Dead Can Dance: Ulysses
Enya: Orinoco Flow
Enya: Watermark
Metallica: One
Ministry: The Missing
Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds: Mercy Seat
Siouxsie and the Banshees: Carousel
Siouxsie and the Banshees: Peek-a-boo
Talk Talk: Inheritance
Best albums of the year, 1967 to 1988:
1967: Pink Floyd: The Piper at the Gates of Dawn
1968: -
1969: Procol Harum: A Salty Dog
1970: Genesis: Trespass
1971: Genesis: Nursery Cryme
1972: Yes: Close to the Edge
1973: Pink Floyd: The Dark Side of the Moon
1974: Mike Oldfield: Hergest Ridge
1975: Electric Light Orchestra: Face the Music
1976: Genesis: A Trick of the Tail
1977: Yes: Going for the One
1978: Genesis: And Then There Were Three
1979: Robert Fripp: Exposure
1980: Talking Heads: Remain in Light
1981: Camel: Nude
1982: Rush: Signals
1983: Ozzy Osbourne: Bark at the Moon
1984: Rush: Grace Under Pressure
1985: Marillion: Misplaced Childhood
1986: Depeche Mode: Black Celebration
1987: Suzanne Vega: Solitude Standing
1988: Dead Can Dance: The Serpent's Egg
Best short tracks (under approx. 12 minutes):
1967: Pink Floyd: Bike
1968: Pink Floyd: Julia Dream
1969: Pink Floyd: Cirrus Minor
1970: The Beatles: The Long and Winding Road
1971: Genesis: The Fountain of Salmacis
1972: Gentle Giant: Schooldays
1973: John Cale: Paris 1919
1974: Mike Oldfield: Mike Oldfield's Single
1975: The Tubes: Up from the Deep
1976: Gong: Chandra
1977: Yes: Going for the One
1978: Genesis: Down and Out
1979: Barclay James Harvest: Play to the World
1980: Saga: Don't Be Late
1981: John Foxx: The Garden
1982: Laurie Anderson: O Superman (For Massenet)
1983: Brian Eno: An Ending (Ascent)
1984: Laurie Anderson: Blue Lagoon
1985: Talk Talk: Time it's Time
1986: Ultravox: All in One Day
1987: Suzanne Vega: Ironbound / Fancy Poultry
1988: Dead Can Dance: The Host of Seraphim
Best long tracks (Approx. 12 minutes or over):
1970: King Crimson: Lizard
1971: Van der Graaf Generator: A Plague of Lighthouse Keepers
1972: Yes: Close to the Edge
1973: King Crimson: Larks' Tongues in Aspic, Part 1
1974: King Crimson: Starless
1975: Mike Oldfield: Ommadawn, Part 1
1976: -
1977: Yes: Awaken
1978: Popol Vuh: Brüder des Schattens, Söhne des Lichts
1979: U.K: Carrying No Cross
1980: Mike Rutherford: Smallcreep's Day
1981: -
1982: Mike Oldfield: Taurus II
1983: Mike Oldfield: Crises
1984: Jean-Michel Jarre: Ethnicolor
1985: Robert Fripp: God Save the King
1986: The Enid: The Change
1987: -
1988: -
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