DEAD CAN DANCE
interview of 1987

We live to the thirtieth floor of a British building since 1981.
Before, I emigrated 5 years in New Zealand, then 4 years in Australia,
Where I met Lisa…

-----Is there in you some Celtic origins?

Brendan : My parents are Irish of origin.

-----and one can discover some Celtic influences in your music…

Lisa : Absolutely…
Brendan : I think that it comes from my father, who played music gaelic and
Of the Irish folk.
Lisa : It is difficult to be without influences…
When one learns a musical language, one takes words of this language a little
everywhere, it is the result of experiences, of the way whose things have been described…

-----Then from where comes this classic side in your music?

Brendan : I think that it is due to the fact that we use a lot of instruments,
Like a painter uses a lot of colours to have the tone
That he wants, we put colouring to our music by the choice of instruments.
It's not sufficient to play the guitar and the battery to put our compositions
in value…

-----If you were painters, what kind of colour would you use?

Lisa : Those that would give back the best natural beauty…
Brendan: Not of the plastic and aggressive colours in any case.

----Do you want to mix electronic music and acoustic instrumentation?

Lisa : No, electronics is only a convenience…
Brendan: We must intend with electronics to make music,
it can help. For example on stage, we use samplings and keyboards,
But it is obvious that i would prefer a formation of strings to machines.

-----What did you make before Dead Can Dance?

Brendan : In Australia and in New Zealand, each of our side, we played
In punk groups . All these groups knew themselves and we had some extraordinary moments between 1977 and 79. Different group musicians was in a way to sharing music between us
And improvised, but all it is finished well…

-----you seem to go circa more of a classic instrumentation, how see yourselves your
Future evolution?

Lisa : One must make what one wants to express at the time rightly, we are not able to
foresee an evolution…
Brendan : For example, we make an optimistic piece, a celebration, that is the reflection of our
state of mind when we create the piece. Finally, I think that we will go farther in
the way of experimentation, we now have more material of studio and instruments, we will be therefore more spontaneous.

-----work-you separately?

Brendan : Yes, sometimes…we work less together that in the past.

-----I would like to come back on the brewing of your influences; how was it done on one hand, on the other hand, ,do you see draw itself a musical current mixing the different cultures?

Brendan : That explains itself easily : I started with playing in a group punk, I can evolved to the thread of years musically. I learned, chosen and developed a language, I found his points of articulations to express me of nearer way of my inspiration and my ideal. My music changed as this language enriched itself; I cannot imagine to constantly play the same music, I have an exploring side. For what concerns this current, if it exist, I don't have a knowledge of it. There is a transition maybe now between the rock and the contemporary music of John Cage and company. I think that people come from personal universes, some evolved on bases of 1977, of others, as for example Wim Merten or artists of Eyeless Gaza, work from music of before guard of sixties and seventies…

----Does to play in an ancient theatre suit you?

Brendan : It is marvellous. I think that stones are the best acoustic case,
even in a badly preserved place. In a cathedral or a church, the sound has a marvellous reaction to the stone, music takes another dimension.

-----Lisa, why don't you sing still in This Mortal Coil?

Lisa : Because no one didn't aask me for that. But that is not important for me because I like to sing pieces that I have me composed, that comes from deep inside of me. I have difficulty to sing covers that Ivo ask me to do because i don't find so much fun in doing that indeed…
Brendan: there is a problem of identification. In This Mortal Coil, it is necessary to identify to something not coming from us, it is difficult to play a music whose deep inspiration doesn't correlate to us; it is nearly a lie…

-----23 envelopes, the group of regular design of 4AD, do never achieve your sleeves…

Brendan : We think that albums are better wrapped if we bring our own pictures. I think that to make an album and to let the sleeve in other hands, it's the same as to write the half of a book, this is not finished…

----The photo of cover of the new album recalls something to Parisians…

Brendan : Yes, you know it?! it is a statue from the Pére-Lachaise…

-----why does there is still this idea of the death in you?

Brendan : It is more an idea of transition, at the symbolic sense. Why do people had made this statue? To symbolise the mind, and the sadness also, because they have remember it of the one that is behind. This album was a painful experience for us, it is very sad.
That is to say that we didn't write music deliberately sad, no but the last year, we had big pains and we suffered, as good in our internal relations that in the one with the outside world, and that feels itself in music. We chose this picture of statue because the album didn't have a sound concept, and we wanted to put nothing that expresses a concept, just something that suggests the atmosphere.

----Is the relative imagery of the death is a concept in one…?

Brendan : This is not a picture of the death. The Christian would say that it is the picture of the transition between life and the beyond.

-----many of people take this imagery to the first degree. It is difficult enough to see it like that…

Brendan : For sure, but I cannot explain my philosophy and my conception of life to the back of sleeves!

-----and what is this philosophy?

Brendan : I am not sure to want to put it like that in shape; it's personal things of which it is difficult to make the report, to explain the reason and the effect. More one generalises, more it is dangerous…In all cases, for me, music is a personal truth…

-----It's maybe also a way of life, Lisa seems really being a white Ophélie Nervalienne!

Brendan : What to say?… (laughing!!!)
Lisa : …???
Brendan : The death is to the centre of our philosophy, as for Catholics. It is necessary to discern it in this way. When you discern the death for the first time, being child, you understand that the world cannot last indefinitely. You are going to have to live your life during years, then, it is important that you develop your attitude, your philosophy towards life.
What are you going to make of all those years to live? It is the starting point and the centre of my philosophy.

-----but this is not a little easy to carry this picture of the death, of the sadness, while saying that is not one of it?

Brendan : I don't know how to say anything more…there is nothing morbid in me, I am someone who's optimist.