''Memento Mori'' is the second studio album by American

rock Rock most often refers to: * Rock (geology), a naturally occurring solid aggregate of minerals or mineraloids * Rock music, a genre of popular music Rock or Rocks may also refer to: Places United Kingdom * Rock, Caerphilly, a location in Wale ...

band Flyleaf, released through A&M/Octone Records on November 10, 2009. The title is a

Latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

phrase meaning "be mindful of death" or "remember you will die". ''Memento Mori'' debuted at number eight on the ''Billboard'' 200, selling 56,000 units in its opening week. It also became the first album by a female-led act to top the ''

Billboard A billboard (also called a hoarding in the UK and many other parts of the world) is a large outdoor advertising structure (a billing board), typically found in high-traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertis ...

'' Hard Rock Albums chart. The album sold more than 311,600 copies in the U.S. in a little over one year.

Background

Memento Mori is the follow-up to their 2005 platinum debut. It contains 14 songs, which were selected out of 18 already written. The band reunited with producer Howard Benson to make the album. The album was recorded at Bay7 Studios in

Los Angeles, California Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...

. It was released on November 10, 2009. The band debuted two songs, " Chasm" and "Circle", from ''

Memento Mori (Latin for "remember (that you have) to die")

'' live during a small acoustic tour in Afghanistan for United States Troops.

Writing

The band began writing new music after their debut album was released. Most of the material was written while the band toured, but some songs date back as early as 2005 and 2006. "In The Dark" was written after the band released '' Flyleaf'', though it was never played live. " Again", "Have We Lost", and "Beautiful Bride" were the first songs to be played live before they were released on the album. " Again", the first single from ''Memento Mori'', was released to radio and digital retail stores August 25, 2009. Meiert Avis directed the music video for "Again", released at midnight September 30, 2009, on MTV. Don Tyler directed the music video for "Beautiful Bride", released October 6, 2009. Diane Martel directed the music video for "Missing", released March 18, 2010
Giles Timms
directed, animated and illustrated the animated viral music video for "Chasm", released on September 22, 2010. The album premiered on the official Flyleaf

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page on November 6, 2009.

Promotion

To promote the album, the band partnered with the online calendar service

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for a series of fan-voted listening parties in various American cities, where they previewed songs from the album as well as music videos. There were eight such events beginning on September 28, 2009.

Reception

''Memento Mori'' currently holds generally favorable reviews on Metacritic with a 69.

Track listing

Bonus tracks

Track notes

* "Tiny Heart" is a re-worked demo of a song that was written in the mid-2000s, before the release of Flyleaf's debut album. * " Again" and "Have We Lost" were written in 2007 and often performed live. These songs underwent lyrical changes during the ''Memento Mori'' sessions. * "Uncle Bobby" is a hidden track that is placed before "Beautiful Bride". The song can be heard by rewinding the disc to -4:28. On digital versions of the album, the song is track 15, after "Arise". * "Set Apart This Dream" was inspired by the best-selling, inspirational John Eldredge book '' Wild at Heart''.Spring Music Preview: July/August
''

Rolling Stone ''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason. The magazine was first known fo ...

''. Published March 20, 2009. Retrieved March 24, 2009. * "Treasure" was written about Lacey's engagement to Joshua Sturm. * The expanded edition bonus track "Enemy" was used during the opening segment of the season 5 ''

Criminal Minds ''Criminal Minds'' is an American police procedural crime drama television series created by Jeff Davis that premiered on CBS on September 22, 2005. It follows a group of criminal profilers who work for the FBI as members of its Behavioral ...

'' episode "Risky Business".

Charts

Weekly charts

Year-end charts

Awards

The album was nominated for a

Dove Award A Dove Award is an accolade by the Gospel Music Association (GMA) of the United States to recognize outstanding achievement in the Christian music industry. The awards ceremonies presented annually and have been held in Nashville, Tennessee exce ...

for Rock Album of the Year at the 42nd GMA Dove Awards.42nd Annual GMA Dove Awards Nominees
on DoveAwards.com

Personnel

Band *

Lacey Sturm Lacey Nicole Sturm ( Mosley, previously Carder; born September 4, 1981) is an American singer and songwriter, known for being lead vocalist of the alternative rock band Flyleaf (band), Flyleaf. In February 2016, Sturm became the first solo femal ...

– lead vocals * Sameer Bhattacharya – lead guitar * Jared Hartmann – rhythm guitar * James Culpepper – drums, percussion,

timpani Timpani (; ) or kettledrums (also informally called timps) are musical instruments in the percussion instrument, percussion family. A type of drum categorised as a hemispherical drum, they consist of a Membranophone, membrane called a drumhead, ...

, and wind chimes * Pat Seals – bass,

cover art Cover art is a type of artwork presented as an illustration or photograph on the outside of a published product, such as a book (often on a dust jacket), magazine, newspaper ( tabloid), comic book, video game ( box art), music album ( album ar ...

Production * Howard Benson – production *

Chris Lord-Alge Chris Lord-Alge is an American mix engineer. He is the brother of both Tom Lord-Alge and Jeff Lord-Alge, both of whom are also audio engineers. Chris and Tom are known for their abundant use of dynamic range compression for molding mixes that ...

– mixing * Dave McNair – mastering * Mike Plotnikoff – audio engineer * Hatsukazu "Hatch" Inagaki – audio engineer * Mark Lewis – audio engineer (1-3) * Jeremy Underwood – assistant engineer * Keith Armstrong – assistant mixing * Nik Karpen – assistant mixing * Andrew Schubert – additional engineer * Brad Townsend – additional engineer * Paul DeCarli – digital editing Additional personnel * Howard Benson – keyboards, programming * Ben Berkman – A&R * James Diener – A&R * Josh Sturm – art direction * Sean Evans – art direction * Mark Holthusean – artwork * Mark Lewis – additional guitars, additional vocals (1-3)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Memento Mori (Album) 2009 albums Flyleaf (band) albums Albums produced by Howard Benson A&M Octone Records albums