Macabre is the second studio album released by Dir En Grey. It was released on September 20, 2000. It was the band's first record to be released in collaboration of Free-Will's Firewall sub-division and Sony Music Entertainment Japan. The original print of Macabre featured an etched, tinted jewel case with five wooden beads placed within the spine. The album proper, like Gauze, included two booklets: one with the lyrics, and the other featuring a related image and poem.
"Macabre -Sanagi no Yume wa Ageha no Hane-" (MACABRE —揚羽ノ羽ノ夢ハ蛹—; see notes)
Kaoru
10:49
10.
"Audrey"
Die
4:33
11.
"Rasetsukoku" (羅刹国; "Rakshasa Country")
Dir En Grey
3:35
12.
"Zakuro" (ザクロ; "Pomegranate")
Kaoru
8:37
13.
"Taiyō no Ao" (太陽の碧; "Blue of the Sun")
Kaoru
6:19
Total length:
72:57
Notes
The album features Russian imagery; the artwork contains Cyrillic; the lyrics for "Deity" are written in Russian; and the song title "Rasetsukoku" was the Chinese name for Russia during the Qing Dynasty.[citation needed]
"Deity" is similar to the Russian word for children, "deti" ("дети"). The accompanying image in the lyric booklet is of a pregnant woman's stomach. A portion of the melody in "Deity" appears to be derived from Johannes Brahms' Hungarian Dance No. 5.[citation needed]
"理由" is normally romanized as "riyū", yet is romanized by the band as "wake"; both "wake" ("訳") and "riyū" ("理由") can be translated as "reason".
"egnirys cimredopyh" is hypodermic syringe spelled backwards; it was written in this manner due to the censorship board in Japan.[citation needed]
When read left to right, Macabre's subtitle "揚羽ノ羽ノ夢ハ蛹" transliterates as "Ageha no hane no yume wa sanagi", or "The Swallowtail's Wings' Dream is the Chrysalis". However, the title contains numbered furigana above it, which suggests that the title is to be read as "Sanagi no yume wa ageha no hane", or "The Chrysalis' Dream is the Swallowtail's Wings".[citation needed]
"Taiyō no Ao" uses a kanji that is commonly read as "midori" and means for "green", whereas the band uses a reading that means "blue".
A rearrangement of the track "Hydra" appears on their 2007 single "Dozing Green" as a B-side,[3] retitled to "Hydra 666".
A re-recording of the track "Rasetsukoku" appears as a bonus track on their 2011 album Dum Spiro Spero.
A re-recording of the track "Macabre -Sanagi no Yume wa Ageha no Hane-" (simply titled MACABRE) appears on the second disc of the Limited Edition of their 2013 mini-album The Unraveling.
A re-recording of the track "Wake" appears on the second disc of the Limited Editions of their 2018 album The Insulated World.[4]
