Dead Can Dance soon became headliners at Melbourne's main post-punk venue, the Crystal Ballroom in St Kilda, and played an Australian farewell show there in May 1982 before moving to London, England, where they signed with alternative music label 4AD.

[5] The artwork, which depicts a ritual mask from New Guinea, "provide[s] a visual reinterpretation of the meaning of the name Dead Can Dance",[6][7] set in a faux Greek typeface.

The album featured "drum-driven, ambient guitar music with chanting, singing and howling",[3] and fit in with the ethereal wave style of label mates Cocteau Twins.

[3] AllMusic described their early work as "as goth as it gets"[8] (despite the group themselves rejecting the label[6]), while the EP saw them "plunging into a wider range of music and style".

[9] For their second album, Spleen and Ideal, the group comprised the core duo of Gerrard and Perry with cello, trombone and tympani added in by session musicians.

The duo's sixth studio album, Into the Labyrinth, was issued in September 1993 and dispensed with guest musicians entirely; it sold 500,000 copies worldwide and appeared in the Billboard 200.

[12] Gerrard released her debut solo recording, The Mirror Pool, and reunited with Perry on the Dead Can Dance studio album Spiritchaser in 1996.

[12] In 1998, Dead Can Dance began recording a follow-up album to Spiritchaser, which was due to be released in early 1999 followed by a planned world tour.

[13] One song from the recording sessions, "The Lotus Eaters", was eventually released on the box set Dead Can Dance (1981-1998) and on the two-disc compilation Wake (2003).

In 2005, the song "Nierika" became part of the opening titles for Mexican television station TV Azteca's soap opera La Chacala.

[14] On 12 May 2011, Brendan Perry announced on his official web forum that Dead Can Dance would record a new album and then embark on two-month world tour.