I've always had an affinity for the music of Dead Can Dance. Their ancient, tribal rhythms, ghostly echoes and buried subliminal textures are perfect for road trips on foggy forgotten highways and evening thunderstorms. Lisa Gerrard's banshee wails and Brendan Perry's haunting vocals perfectly compliment each other, the sound of resurrected souls rising like smoke from the earth.

It's been three years since Gerrard released her first solo release, The Mirror Pool, an album of songs that didn't quite blend with the Dead Can Dance repertoire. But whereas that album had a decidedly orchestral feel, Duality is a more organic effort. On tracks like the disc's opener, "Shadow Magnet" and the incredibly beautiful "Forest Veil," Gerrard is trying for a new sound, opening doors which may eventually lead her to break down the barriers of her gothic world beat.

Created with Pieter Bourke, who produced Gerrard's Mirror Pool, Duality is not just a Dead Can Dance record with Bourke filling Brendan Perry's shoes. Rather, it's the sound of a woman overcoming the limitations of a genre she helped to create. The atmospheric aesthetics range from fire- and- brimstone rhythmic patterns to elemental beauty and sonic warfare, comprising this record more of works of art than pieces of music.

-Ryan Schreiber