Spleen and Ideal is the second album recorded by Dead Can Dance

Dead Can Dance

Dead Can Dance are an ethereal neoclassical duo formed in Melbourne, Australia, in August 1981, by Lisa Gerrard and Brendan Perry. The band relocated to London in May 1982 and disbanded in 1998. Their 1996 album Spiritchaser reached No. 1 on the Billboard Top World Music Albums Chart...

, released in 1986. The line up continued with Brendan Perry, Lisa Gerrard, Scott Rodger, James Pinker and Peter Ulrich with the addition of Gus Ferguson on Cello. A rather ethereal form of gothic music

Gothic rock

Gothic rock is a musical subgenre of post-punk and alternative rock that formed during the late 1970s. Gothic rock bands grew from the strong ties they had to the English punk rock and emerging post-punk scenes...

, similar to the origins of its debut album, Dead Can Dance

Dead Can Dance (album)

Dead Can Dance is the debut album recorded by Dead Can Dance in 1984. This album differs greatly from later Dead Can Dance releases. The instrumentation consisted of guitars, bass and drums with added percussion and the very distinct sound of the Yang Chin as played by Lisa Gerrard. This album has...

, and followed a more world music

World music

World music is a term with widely varying definitions, often encompassing music which is primarily identified as another genre. This is evidenced by world music definitions such as "all of the music in the world" or "somebody else's local music"...

- and neoclassical

Neoclassical (Dark Wave)

Neoclassical Dark Wave refers to a music genre within the Dark Wave movement. It is characterized by the use of ethereal atmosphere and angelic female voices but also adds strong influences from classical music. Neoclassical Dark Wave is distinct from the academic art music form known as...

-oriented content, with lyrics based on the writings of Charles Baudelaire

Charles Baudelaire

Charles Baudelaire was a French poet who produced notable work as an essayist, art critic, and pioneering translator of Edgar Allan Poe. His most famous work, Les Fleurs du mal expresses the changing nature of beauty in modern, industrializing Paris during the nineteenth century...

 and Thomas de Quincey

Thomas de Quincey

Thomas Penson de Quincey was an English esssayist, best known for his Confessions of an English Opium-Eater .-Child and student:...

. It is considered the group's best album from a lyrical standpoint.

Track listing

1. "De Profundis (Out of the Depths of Sorrow)" – 4:00
2. "Ascension" – 3:05
3. "Circumradiant Dawn" – 3:17
4. "The Cardinal Sin" – 5:29
5. "Mesmerism" – 3:53
6. "Enigma of the Absolute" – 4:13
7. "Advent" – 5:19
8. "Avatar" – 4:35
9. "Indoctrination (A Design for Living)" – 4:16

Release history

Country	Date
Australia Australia Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...	1 September 1986
United States United States The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...	8 March 1994

External links

• Spleen and Ideal at Dead-Can-Dance.com
• Spleen and Ideal Lyrics at Dead-Can-Dance.com