Mer de Noms

Mer de Noms
Studio album by A Perfect Circle
Released	May 23, 2000
Genre	Alternative rock Alternative metal
Length	44:25
Label	Virgin Records
Producer	Billy Howerdel
A Perfect Circle chronology
Mer De Noms (2000) Thirteenth Step (2003)

Professional ratings
Review scores
Source	Rating
Allmusic	[1]
Entertainment Weekly	(A-)[2]
Melody Maker	[3]
MTV Asia	(8/10)[4]
NME	(7/10)[5]
Q	[6]
Rolling Stone	[7]
Sputnikmusic	[8]

Mer de Noms (French for Sea of Surnames) is the debut album by American rock band A Perfect Circle. The album was released under Compact Disc format on May 23, 2000. It was certified platinum by the RIAA on October 31, 2000. The album entered the Billboard 200 at No. 4, making it the highest ever Billboard 200 debut for a rock band's first album.^[9] It sold over 188,000 copies in the first week, and stayed on the charts for 51 consecutive weeks.^[10] The album peaked at No. 27 on the Billboard Top Pop Catalog Albums on October 4, 2003, three years after the album's release.

Overview

Most of the album's lyrics were dedicated to various people that lead singer Maynard James Keenan knew. The title of the album is French for "sea of names". Without the spaces between the words the title could be read as "seanames", or alternatively as "shit names". The track listing consists of various names such as "Judith", "Breña", "Rose", "Thomas", "Magdalena", "Orestes", and "Renholdër" (for musician Danny Lohner).

The symbols on the front cover of the album can be translated to "LA CASCADE DES PRENOMS", which translated to English means "the waterfall of first names".

Track listing

All songs written and composed by Billy Howerdel and Maynard James Keenan. 

CD
No.	Title	Length
1.	"The Hollow"	2:58
2.	"Magdalena"	4:06
3.	"Rose"	3:26
4.	"Judith"	4:07
5.	"Orestes"	4:48
6.	"3 Libras"	3:39
7.	"Sleeping Beauty"	4:10
8.	"Thomas"	3:29
9.	"Renholdër"	2:24
10.	"Thinking of You"	4:34
11.	"Breña"	4:24
12.	"Over"	2:21

Japanese Edition
No.	Title	Length
13.	"Orestes (Demo)" (Bonus Track)	3:24

The vinyl version contains "Sleeping Beauty" with extended intro (04:57) and alternate mix of "Over" (03:07).

Symbols

Inside the insert the track names appear to be randomly spelled out in symbols. One way to decipher the symbols is to match the song titles using the normal alphabet with the song titles inside the insert.

The symbols which have popularly become known online as “APC Text”, “Mayan”, or “Elegant Mayan”, have become surprisingly widespread, appearing in tattoos, computer fonts, and independent artwork.^{[citation needed]}

A legend depicting the symbol's letters transliterated from the Latin alphabet.

Inside the insert there are twelve pictures (one for each song) and next to each one a song title, and beneath that a portion of the song's lyrics all written out in the symbols shown above. An example of this would be the drawing of the red octopus, which has the song name "Orestes" and "Sever this umbilical residue" beneath it.

Trivia

"Mer de Noms," in French, is (contrary to some views) correct grammar, as the plural "names" (noms) does not take the plural partitive "des" as it is not referring to specific names. (It is being used as a preposition.) Likely an in-joke by Keenan, "Mer" and "de" may still be combined to get "Merde," roughly changing the album title to "Shit Names."

Personnel

• Maynard James Keenan - vocals,
• Billy Howerdel - guitars, background vocals, keyboards, piano, production, mixing,
• Josh Freese - drums, percussion
• Paz Lenchantin -background vocals, bass guitar
• Alan Moulder - mixing
• Frank Gryner - drum engineering

Charts

Album

Year	Chart	Position
2000	Billboard 200	4
	Top Canadian Albums	5
	Top Internet Albums	5

Singles

Year	Single	Chart	Position
2000	"3 Libras"	Mainstream Rock Tracks	12
		Modern Rock Tracks	12
	"Judith"	Mainstream Rock Tracks	4
		Modern Rock Tracks	5
2001	"The Hollow"	Mainstream Rock Tracks	14
		Modern Rock Tracks	17

References

1. ^ Allmusic review
2. ^ Entertainment Weekly review
3. ^ Melody Maker review
4. ^ MTV Asia review
5. ^ NME review
6. ^ Q review
7. ^ Rolling Stone review
8. ^ Sputnikmusic review
9. ^ "A Perfect Circle Storms Onto Chart with Highest Debuting First Album Ever From a Rock Band". NY Rock. June 2, 2000. http://www.nyrock.com/worldbeat/06_2000/060200.asp. Retrieved 2009-11-12. 
10. ^ Billboard.com

External links

• Mer de Noms symbols font
• "Worldwide chart info A Perfect Circle Mer de Noms". www.ultratop.be. http://www.ultratop.be/en/showitem.asp?interpret=A+Perfect+Circle&titel=Mer+de+noms&cat=a. Retrieved 4 September 2011.