"Flowers in Formaldehyde" is the second EP

Extended play

An EP is a musical recording which contains more music than a single, but is too short to qualify as a full album or LP. The term EP originally referred only to specific types of vinyl records other than 78 rpm standard play records and LP records, but it is now applied to mid-length Compact...

 by darkwave

Darkwave

Dark Wave or darkwave is a music genre that began in the late 1970s, coinciding with the popularity of New Wave and post-punk. Building on those basic principles, dark wave added dark, introspective lyrics and an undertone of sorrow for some bands...

 band Sopor Aeternus & the Ensemble of Shadows, and was released in 2004 as a companion to the album "La Chambre D'Echo" - Where the dead Birds sing. Only 2,000 CDs and 700 LPs were pressed.

Originally announced as The Adventures of Ms Penny Dreadful, "Flowers" featured four new songs, two instrumentals of songs from "La Chambre D'Echo" and an extensive remix of "Do you know my Name ?" from Sopor Aeternus' first album, "...Ich töte mich jedesmal aufs Neue, doch ich bin unsterblich, und ich erstehe wieder auf; in einer Vision des Untergangs...". The first half of the EP remains some of Sopor Aeternus' most pop-oriented work yet.

"Flowers in Formaldehyde" was re-issued the following year as part of the rarities box set Like a Corpse standing in Desperation

Like a Corpse standing in Desperation

Like a Corpse standing in Desperation is the title of a career-spanning rarities box set by darkwave band Sopor Aeternus & the Ensemble of Shadows that was released in 2005...

. Apocalyptic Vision explained that extensive counterfeit

Counterfeit

To counterfeit means to illegally imitate something. Counterfeit products are often produced with the intent to take advantage of the superior value of the imitated product...

ing of the EP was cause for its inclusion in the set.

Track listing

All songs written by Anna-Varney Cantodea.

1. "In an Hour Darkly" – 4:58
2. "The Conqueror Worm
   The Conqueror Worm
   "The Conqueror Worm" is a poem by Edgar Allan Poe about human mortality and the inevitability of death. It was first published separately in Graham's Magazine in 1843, but quickly became associated with Poe's short story "Ligeia" after Poe added the poem to a revised publication of the story in 1845...
   
    (by Edgar Allan Poe
   Edgar Allan Poe
   Edgar Allan Poe was an American author, poet, editor and literary critic, considered part of the American Romantic Movement. Best known for his tales of mystery and the macabre, Poe was one of the earliest American practitioners of the short story and is considered the inventor of the detective...
   
   )" – 3:28
3. "Minnesang" – 3:36
4. "Von der Einfalt" – 1:40
5. "Hearse-shaped Basins of Darkest Matter (instrumental)" – 3:39
6. "Leeches & Deception (instrumental)" – 6:59
7. "Extract from: The Voices of the Dead" – 0:58
8. "Do you know my Name ? / What has happened while we slept ?" – 5:06

Personnel

• Susannah Simmons: Violin
  Violin
  The violin is a string instrument, usually with four strings tuned in perfect fifths. It is the smallest, highest-pitched member of the violin family of string instruments, which includes the viola and cello....
  
  
• Elizabeth Tollington: Cello
  Cello
  The cello is a bowed string instrument with four strings tuned in perfect fifths. It is a member of the violin family of musical instruments, which also includes the violin, viola, and double bass. Old forms of the instrument in the Baroque era are baryton and viol .A person who plays a cello is...
  
  
• Miriam Hughes: Flute
  Flute
  The flute is a musical instrument of the woodwind family. Unlike woodwind instruments with reeds, a flute is an aerophone or reedless wind instrument that produces its sound from the flow of air across an opening...
  
  
• Tonia Price: Clarinet
  Clarinet
  The clarinet is a musical instrument of woodwind type. The name derives from adding the suffix -et to the Italian word clarino , as the first clarinets had a strident tone similar to that of a trumpet. The instrument has an approximately cylindrical bore, and uses a single reed...
  
  
• Andrew Pettitt: Oboe
  Oboe
  The oboe is a double reed musical instrument of the woodwind family. In English, prior to 1770, the instrument was called "hautbois" , "hoboy", or "French hoboy". The spelling "oboe" was adopted into English ca...
  
  
• Doreena Gor: Bassoon
  Bassoon
  The bassoon is a woodwind instrument in the double reed family that typically plays music written in the bass and tenor registers, and occasionally higher. Appearing in its modern form in the 19th century, the bassoon figures prominently in orchestral, concert band and chamber music literature...
  
  
• Tim Barber: Trumpet
• Julian Turner: Trombone
  Trombone
  The trombone is a musical instrument in the brass family. Like all brass instruments, sound is produced when the player’s vibrating lips cause the air column inside the instrument to vibrate...
  
  
• Anthony Bartley: Tuba
  Tuba
  The tuba is the largest and lowest-pitched brass instrument. Sound is produced by vibrating or "buzzing" the lips into a large cupped mouthpiece. It is one of the most recent additions to the modern symphony orchestra, first appearing in the mid-19th century, when it largely replaced the...
  
  
• Paul Brook: Drums
• Anna-Varney Cantodea: Vocals, all other instruments and programming