Within the Realm of a Dying Sun

With Dead Can Dance now firmly centred around the core of Brendan Perry and Lisa Gerrard, they released their third album, Within The Realm Of A Dying Sun, in the summer of 1987, showing both a continued maturity in their sound and a rise in their popularity.

Recorded during an intense period of musical and personal growth for the band, the album’s eight songs are split equally between the duo, with the first half sung by Brendan Perry and the second by Lisa Gerrard.

At the time, Q Magazine described the album as combining “superb voice, ethereal church choirs, sweeping strings and a brochure of ethnic music: Middle Eastern, Indian, Moorish, anywhere but London’s East End where the couple resided.” The cover adds to the album’s aura of mystery with a photograph of the Raspail family grave at Père-Lachaise cemetery in Paris.