Coil (band)
Coil were an English experimental music group formed in 1982 in London and dissolved in 2005. Initially envisioned as a solo project by musician John Balance, Coil evolved into a full-time project with the addition of his partner and Psychic TV bandmate Peter Christopherson. Coil's work explored themes related to the occult, sexuality, alchemy, and drugs while influencing genres such as gothic rock, neofolk and dark ambient. AllMusic called the group "one of the most beloved, mythologized groups to emerge from the British post-industrial scene."
After the release of their 1984 debut EP How to Destroy Angels, Coil joined Some Bizzare Records, through which they released two full-length albums, Scatology and Horse Rotorvator. In 1985, the group began working on a series of soundtracks, among them the rejected score for the first Hellraiser film. After departing from Some Bizzare, Coil established their own record label, Threshold House, through which they produced and released Love's Secret Domain. Financial difficulties slowed the group's work in the early 1990s before they returned to the project on releases such as Astral Disaster, and the Musick to Play in the Dark series composed of Vol. 1 and Vol. 2, as well as releasing several projects under aliases such as Black Light District, ELpH, and Time Machines.
Balance and Christopherson were the only constant members; other contributors throughout the band's career included Stephen Thrower, Danny Hyde, Drew McDowall, William Breeze, Thighpaulsandra and Ossian Brown. With involvement from these members, the group also started several smaller independent vanity labels, including Eskaton and Chalice. The group's first live performance in 16 years occurred in 1999, and began a series of mini-tours that would last until 2004. Following the accidental death of John Balance on 13 November 2004, Christopherson formally announced that Coil as a creative entity had ceased to exist, ending the Coil discography with The Ape of Naples. Posthumous releases and compilations of unreleased material have since followed this. Christopherson died in 2010.
History
1982–1983: Formation and early years
In 1978, John Balance was a teenage zine journalist, writing—along with his schoolmate Tom Craig, a grandson of Edward Carrick and great-grandson of Edward Gordon Craig—under a moniker Stabmental, through which he published articles on UK underground artists, including seminal industrial bands Throbbing Gristle and Cabaret Voltaire. A Throbbing Gristle fan, Balance had contacted them via mail, and thus befriended the Throbbing Gristle frontperson Genesis P-Orridge. In February 1980, Balance had attended a Throbbing Gristle gig recorded and released as Heathen Earth, where he had first met P-Orridge's bandmate Peter Christopherson and befriended him as well.Following the dissolution of Throbbing Gristle in 1981, P-Orridge, Christopherson, and Alex Fergusson went on to form the new project, titled Psychic TV, along with the accompanying fellowship titled Thee Temple ov Psychick Youth. Balance, who had attended the University of Sussex for a short time and participated in Brian Williams' Lustmord project, returned in London to live with Christopherson—with whom a romantic partnership had begun. As a Psychic TV member, Balance participated in the recording of the single "Just Drifting" and, the following year, of the album Dreams Less Sweet.
Already having an experience of performing and recording previous to his tenure in Psychic TV, Balance went on to use the name Coil in 1982, originally envisioned for a solo project. In 1983, Balance wrote a manifesto titled The Price of Existence Is Eternal Warfare and sent a tape of the song "On Balance", dated 5 May 1982, to Gary Levermore's label Third Mind Records for an inclusion on a compilation album Rising From The Red Sand; Levermore, however, had rejected the track. Despite this, Balance had recorded three more new tracks—"S for Sleep", "Red Weather", and "Here to Here "—on 11 May 1983. On 4 August 1983, Coil—as the duo of Balance and Christopherson—had played its first gig in London at the Magenta Club, during a screening of films by Cerith Wyn Evans and Derek Jarman. Since Christopherson's commitments for Psychic TV—in which he had become disillusioned due to growing conflict with P-Orridge—still limited his participation in Coil, Balance approached John Gosling—also Psychic TV member who fronted his own project Zos Kia—to work with. Balance's and Gosling's collaboration resulted in the next three gigs during 1983, with the last one being performed in December on Berlin Atonal festival, where Balance participated as both Psychic TV and Coil member. The recordings from aforementioned gigs, as well as "On Balance", were later included on Zos Kia/Coil split album Transparent, released in February 1984 by Austrian label Nekrophile Records. Since January 1984, Balance and Christopherson had departed from Psychic TV and the Temple of Psychic Youth, in order to make Coil as a full-time concern.
1984–1986: ''How to Destroy Angels'' and Some Bizzare years
The band's official recording debut, an extended play titled How to Destroy Angels, was released on the Good Friday of 1984 by a Belgian-based label L.A.Y.L.A.H. Antirecords. Recorded on 19 February 1984 at Britannia Row Studios, the album was dedicated to Mars as the god of spring and war, using predominantly iron and steel instruments.Shortly after in May 1984, Coil went on to record their first full-length studio album, eventually titled Scatology, approaching JG Thirlwell as a co-producer and co-composer; several others contributors, including Stephen Thrower, Alex Fergusson and Gavin Friday, took part in its recording. Scatology's themes echoed those of How to Destroy Angels, while focusing mainly on alchemy as an idea of transforming matter.
Scatology was released in early 1985 with a 1984 copyright date by the band's own label, Force & Form, and K.422, to mainly positive feedback. Shortly after, a single featuring a remix of "Panic" and a cover of "Tainted Love" was released, with the profits being donated to the Terrence Higgins Trust; hailed since then as the first AIDS benefit music release, it was supported with the "Tainted Love" video directed by Christopherson, which was purchased by The Museum of Modern Art in New York, U.S.
Horse Rotorvator followed in 1986 as the next full-length release. Although songs such as "The Anal Staircase" and "Circles of Mania" sound like evolved versions of Scatology material, the album is characterized by slower tempos, and represented a new direction for the group. The album has a darker theme than previous releases, according to Balance:
Horse Rotorvator was this vision I'd had of this mechanical/flesh thing that ploughed up the earth and I really did have a vision of it—a real horrible, burning, dripping, jaw-like vision in the night... The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse killed their horses and use their jawbones to make this huge earth-moving machine."
The artwork features a photograph of the location of a notorious IRA bombing, in which a bomb was detonated on a military orchestra pavilion. Horse Rotorvator was in part influenced by the AIDS-related deaths of some of their friends. Furthermore, the song "Ostia " is about the mysterious death of Pier Paolo Pasolini, as well as what Balance described as "the number one suicide spot in the world", the white cliffs of Dover.
''Gold Is the Metal...'' and ''Unnatural History'' (1986–1990)
After the release of Horse Rotorvator, Coil left Some Bizzare Records, since they fell out with its owner Stevo Pearce. Gold Is the Metal followed as a full-length release in 1987, marking the beginning of the band's own label, Threshold House—the album is described in the liner notes as "not the follow-up to Horse Rotorvator, but a completely separate package – a stopgap and a breathing space – the space between two twins", which refers to Horse Rotorvator and Love's Secret Domain.The 13-track Unnatural History compilation was then released on Threshold House in 1990. The first three songs on the album were first released as one half of the Nightmare Culture mini-album.
''Love's Secret Domain'' (1991–1992)
Love's Secret Domain followed in 1991 as the next "proper" Coil album, although a few minor releases had been produced since Horse Rotorvator. LSD represents a progression in Coil's style and became a template for what would be representative of newer waves of post-industrial music, blended with their own style of acid house. Although the album was more upbeat, it was not intended as a dance record, as Christopherson explained "I wouldn't say it's a party atmosphere, but it's more positive." "Windowpane" and a Jack Dangers remix of "The Snow" were released as singles, both of which had music videos directed by Christopherson. The video for "Windowpane" was shot in the Golden Triangle, where, Balance claimed, "the original Thai and Burmese drug barons used to exchange opium for gold bars with the CIA." Christopherson recalled "John discovered while he was performing that where he was standing was quicksand! In the video you can actually see him getting deeper and deeper." Furthermore, Thai friends of the group commented that they had known of several people that died where Coil had shot footage for the music video.A music video for the song "Love's Secret Domain" was also shot, which was initially unreleased due to its nature: as Christopherson explained, "We shot 'Love's Secret Domain' in a go-go boy bar in Bangkok; with John performing on stage with about 20 or 30 dancing boys, which probably won't get played on MTV, in fact!" As of January 2015, the music video is viewable on more than one YouTube channel. Stolen & Contaminated Songs followed as a full-length release in 1992. However, as with Gold Is the Metal..., it is a collection of outtakes and demos from the LSD era.