Produced and arranged by Valor Kand and Christian Death except Lament (Over the Shadows) which was produced by Eric Westfall
Engineered by Eric Westfall at Rusk Sound Studios and Mad Dog Studios, Los Angeles
Assistant Engineers - Kevin Beauchamp and Karenn Ohlinder
Mastered by Richard Simpson

* Cavity (live) and Theatre of Pain (live) are bonus tracks on releases marked*** only
* Cavity (live) and Theatre of Pain (live) were recorded at Hollywood Berwin Entertainment Center on 20 October 1984
   and previously released on the The Decomposition of Violets - An Evening with Christian Death Live in Hollywood album

Musicians: Rozz Williams (vocals & violin), Valor Kand (guitars, piano, cello & backing vocals),
            Gitane DeMone (keyboards & backing vocals), David Glass (drums, percussion & backing vocals), Randy Wilde (bass),
             Eric Westfall (violen & accordian synth), Bill Swain (tuba), Richard Hurwitz (trumpet), Michael Andraes (clarinet),
             Sevan Kand (crying), Barry Galvin+ (guitar)

+ Barry Galvin appears on Cavity (live) and Theatre of Pain (live) only

L'Invitation Au Suicide, Cleopatra & Candlelight release
Cover: CHOP
Booklet design and choice of texts: Mary Lemeur, Yann Farcy and Gerard Rabel

Important, King Records & LSR Records release
Cover and booklet concept and design: Rozz Wiliams (with thanks to Kris Fuller)
Front and back cover illustrations: The Souls of Paolo & Francesca and Beatrice appears among Angels both from
                                     Dante's Divine Comedy by Gustave Dore

A doctor, thirty-seven years of age, who at twenty-seven had suffered from severe neurasthenia accompanied by insomnia and phobias, suffered from a new attack. He had axaggeration of the patellar reflexes, quivering of the eyelids when the eyes were closed, sexual weakness, anaemia, constipation, and fear of becoming insane. To these symptons there was added from time to time the impulse to kill his own little daughter, the first and only child of a recent and happy marriage. "The idea," he wrote despairingly to me, "suddenly comes into my brain like a red-hot iron. I feel it arrive; I see it gain force. It makes me run to the child's room, and impels me to commit... what I do not wish to comment. I take my child in my arms, and am on the point of throwing her down the stairs or out of the window, according to the place in which I happen to be. Hitherto, by supreme and unhoped-for effort, I have succeeded in conquering myself, and have clasped my darling child in my arms and kissed her as if the ask pardon for what I did. No one has read in my face the horror that seizes me. I look a normal man, but perhaps I am not. Is there a frontier that seperates me from insanity, or have I already crossed?"
 
 
 

"What is it? Who is there? H'm!" (The patient sits upon the bed and stares at a dark corner of the room.) "The gods in prison! There aer gods down there! They have their feet in space. What is it they say?" (as if he heard with difficulty a voice in the distance). "A hippopotamus' skin for the Czarina? Go and be a nun! Go and be a monk! What soldiers? You have seen in me a mystical conscience that was not too nice. My wife" (the patient is not married) "is treated like a slave, or rather like a Triton. The silent powers have seized this document. You have filled up the space; she has squandered her...her... money. They have squandered your money" (as if speaking to a person close at hand). "But you have some apperance - you have some apperance - it is unworthy! They have gone some distance. I tell you in silence that it is necessary not to undo distances; it is necessary to hold onto them by rings or large spheres. Run to the celestial spheres. That man there had poison I wish" (turning to the attendant) "to make her complete. If I make a letter with a badly formed turn, I am not pleased, but it has expression - yes, it has much expression. The force of the stars must be prohibited. Jehovah! Respect the stars! Respect others! That makes a train again. The Italians and then this point. That resembles the base like a hole on a hole. Don't be silly! If I hear some bad tastes?" (as if listening at the telephone). "Yes, a little. It is some poison. The doctor also has seen it with me, so go away. In rhythm all the small actions are seen, with little tension, without development. I, the fulness, wish it full. There is a train drawn by insects. I have three giant lovers."
 
 
 

G.C., aged thirty-five, father of a family, who had suffered from syphilis at seventeen, had an attack of periostitis of the jaw. An abscess formed in the wall of the buccal cavity, and there was very great external tumefaction. The abscess having been incised and the periostitis cured, the patient lamented that he had become gross, deformed, grotesque, and very tall.
 
 
 

"What is your name?" "A.R." "How old are you?" "Twenty-five." "Where do you live?" "At Florence." "In what street?" "Via Parione." "At what number?" Here she indicates correctly the number and the flat. "Are your father and your mother living?" "I don't know." "What day is it?" "Tuesday" (it is Wednesday). "What month is this?" "January" (correct). "What year is it?" "1902." "What place is this?" "I don't know." "Is it your home?" "Yes." "But who are those persons round about you?" "They are patients." "Are these patints at your home?" "I am not at home." "Where are you then?" "At the asylum." "And who stays at the asylum?" "Those who are mentally ill." "Are you mentally ill?" She nods assent. "How long have you been at the asylum?" "For four years." "Do you love your father?" "Yes." "Can you sew?" I can read." "Have you been at school?" "At the communal schools." "Would you like to go home?" "Yes." "Are you glad to remain here?" "Yes, certainly." "Is it true that you have sometimes seen the devil?" "Yes." "What is he like?" "He is black." "Is it true that your mother has also been confined in the asylum?" She indicates assent, looks across the room, and points out her mother who, in fact, is present. "Is it true that you aer pregnant?" "I have borne a child." "What is his name?" "Giulio." "Where is he?" "He is dead." "When did he die?" "He was never born," "Why then, did you tell me that you had borne him?" "For fun." "Do you think you will become a saint?" "Yes." "What saint?" "The Madonna of the Lily."
 
 

Ce flux, cette nausee, ces lanieres, c'est dans ceci que commence le Feu. Le feu de langues. Le feu tisse en torsades de langues, dans le miroitement de la terre qui s'ouvre comme un ventre en gesine, aux entrailles de miel et de sucre. De toute sa blessure obscene il baille ce ventre mou, mais le feu baille par-dessus en langues tordues et ardentes qui portent a leur pointe des soupiraux comme de la soif. Ce feu tordu comme des nuages dans l'eau limpide, avec a cote la lumiere qui trace une regle et des cils. Et la terre de toute parts entr'ouverte et montrant d'arides secrets. Des secrets comme des surfaces. La terre et ses nerfs, et ses prehistoriques solitudes, la terre aux geologies primitives, ou se decouvrent des pans du monde dans une ombre noire comme le charbon. - La terre est  mere sous la glace du feu. Voyez le feu dans les Trois Rayons, avec le couronnement de sa criniere ou grouillent des yeux. Le centre ardent et convulse de ce feu est comme la pointe ecartelee du tonnerre a la cime du firmament. Le centre blanc des convulsions. Un absolu d'eclat dans l'echauffouree de la force. La pointe epouvantable de la force qui se brise dans un tintamarre tout bleu.
Les Trois Rayons font un eventail dont les branches tombent a pic et convergent vers le meme centre. Ce centre est un disque laiteux recouvert d'une spirale d'eclipses.
L'ombre de l'eclipse fait un mur surles zigzags de la haute maconnerie celeste.
Mais au-dessus du ciel est le Double-Cheval. L'evocation du Cheval trempe dans la lumiere da la force, sur un fond de mur elime et presse jusqu'a la corde. La corde de son double poitrail. Et en lui le premier des deux est beaucoup plus etrange que l'autre. C'est lui qui ramasse l'eclat dont le deuxieme n'est que l'ombre lourde.
Plus bas encore que l'ombre du mur, la tete et le poitrail du  cheval font une ombre, comme si toute l'eau du monde elevait l'orifice d'un puits.
L'eventail ouvert domine une pyramide de cimes, un immense concert de sommets. Une ide de desert plane sur ces sommets au-dessus desquels un astre echevele flotte, horriblement, inexpliquablement suspendu. Suspendu comme le bien dans l'homme, ou le mal dans le commerce d'homme a homme, ou la mort dans la vie. Force giratoire des astres.
Mais derriere cette vision d'absolu , ce systeme de plantes, d'etoiles, de terrains tranches jusqu'a l'os, derriere cette ardente floculation de germes, cette geometrie de recherches, ce systeme giratoire de sommets, derriere ce soc plante dans l'esprit et cet esprit qui degage ses fibres, decouvre ses sediments, derriere cette main d'homme enfin qui imprime son pouce dur et dessine ses tatonnements, derriere ce melange de manipulations et de cervelle, et ces puits dans tous les sens de l'ame, et ces cavernes dans la realite, se dresse la Ville aux murailles bardees, la Ville immensement haute, et qui n'a pas trop de toui le ciel pour lui faire un plafond ou des plantes poussent en sens inverse et avec une vitesse d'astres jetes.
Cette ville de cavernes et de murs qui projette sur l'abime absolu des arches pleines et des caves comme des ponts. Que l'on voudrait dans le creux de ces arches, dans l'arcature de ces ponts inserer le creux d'une epaule demesurement grande, d'une epaule ou diverge le sang. Et placer son corps en repos et sa tete ou fourmillent les reves, sur le rebord de ces corniches geantes ou s'etage le firmament.
Car le ciel de Bible est dessus ou courent des nuages blancs. Mais  les menaces douces de ces nuages. Mais les orages. Et ce Sinai dont ils laissent percer les flammeches. Mais l'ombre portee de la terre, et  l'eclairage assourdi et crayeux. Mais cette ombre en forme de chevre enfin et ce bouc! Et le Sabbat des Constellations.
Un cri pour ramasser tout cela et une langue pour m'y pendre.
Tous ces reflux commencent a moi. Montrez-moi l'insertion de la terre, la charniere de mon esprit, le commencement affreux de mes ongles. Un bloc, un immense bloc faux me separe de mon mensonge. Et ce bloc est de la couleur qu'on voudra.
Le monde y bave comme la mer rocheuse, et moi evec les reflux de l'amour.
Chiens, avez-vous fini de rouler vos galets sur mon ame. Moi. Moi. Tournez la page des gravats. Moi aussi j'espere le gravier celeste et la plage qui n'a plus de bords. Il faut que ce feu commence a moi. Ce feu et ces langues, et les cavernes de ma gestation. Que les blocs de glace reviennent s'echouer sous mes dents. J'ai le crane epais, mais l'ame lisse, un coeur de matiere echouee. J'ai absence de meteores, absence de soufflets enflammes. Je cherche dans mon gosier des noms, et comme le cil vibratile des choses. L'odeur du neant, un relent d'absurde, le fumier de la mort entiere... L'humour leger et rarefie. Moi aussi je n'attends que le vent. Qu'il s'appelle amour ou misere, il ne pourra guere m'echouer que sur une plage d'ossements.