Live Four (2003...a) [Coil...CD]

01 I Am Angie Bowie (Sine Waves)
02 Last Rites Of Spring
03 Are You Shivering?
04 Amethyst Deceivers
05 A Warning From The Sun
06 The Universe Is A Haunted House
07 Ostia
08 I Don't Want To Be The One
09 Bang Bang [Sonny Bono]
10 An Unearthly Red

Notes...

Recorded in Prague on October 29 and Vienna on October 29, 2002.
Also issued in the Live Box.

Review...

This documents the Coil concerts that took place throughout Europe in the fall of 2002. As such, it is the most eclectic of the four discs, containing four songs that have never been on an album, and several other songs rarely performed in their live shows. "I Am Angie Bowie (Sine Waves)" opens the disc, with its mind-scraping oscillations and Balance's absurd shouts of "I am Angie Bowie! No!" For the next song, Coil resurrect the long-discarded track "Last Rites of Spring" from Gold is the Metal, and expand it into a 10-minute excursion paying homage to the author of Naked Lunch and Electronic Revolution: "William S. Burroughs is hallucinating is space," intones a confident Balance. "Are You Shivering?" and the omnipresent "Amethyst Deceivers" are more or less faithfully reproduced here. John Balance's playful audience-baiting is in rare form on "The Universe is a Haunted House" as he darkly intones "I'm not here..." out of the left stereo channel, then answers "I am there..." from the right. The song unexpectedly mutates into a shattering reprise of Coil's acid rave classic "Windowpane." The mix is just right on this disc, with vocals and music well-balanced and reproduced crisply for home listening. "Bang Bang" is the rare instance of Coil covering someone else's song, in this case a Cher (!) ballad penned by the late Sonny Bono. Balance's delivery is solemn and haunting, turning the song into an icy murder ballad, although I can't help but be amused by Coil's outrageously campy choice to cover this song. The disc ends with the scary bombast of "An Unearthly Red," a noisy, industrial invocation of war: "I didn't want to do it!" screams Balance, "God told me to do it!" A computer-animated flight simulation ending with a harrowing crash into the World Trade Center accompanied this song in concert. - Jonathan Dean

Live Three (2003...b) [Coil...CD]

01 Anarcadia: All Horned Animals
02 Amethyst Deceivers
03 Slur
04 A Cold Cell
05 Broccoli
06 Paranoid Inlay
07 Sick Mirrors (Version)
08 A.Y.O.R.
09 Backwards

Notes...

Recorded in Bologna, April 6, 2002.
Also issued in the Live Box.

Reviews...

This documents a Spring 2002 show performed in Bologna. It was an interesting period for Coil performances, as Thighpaulsandra temporarily left the line-up to tour with Spiritualized. To make up for his noticeable absence, Peter and John enlisted Mike York and Cliff Stapleton to fill in with hurdy-gurdy and Breton pipes. This new, exotic instrumentation adds an unstable, organic element to the performance that works well with the setlist chosen for these shows. The disc opens with the ritualized workout of "Anarcadia: All Horned Animals." If you've heard The Remote Viewer EP, these ethnic-inflected drones will sound very familiar, not entirely dissimilar from Taj Mahal Travellers or The Magic Carpathians at their most psychedelic. "Amethyst Deceivers" is here again, one of four slightly variant versions available in the box set. The classic track "Slur" from Horse Rotorvator is given a faithful rendition, but Balance's voice is not quite equal to the job of singing this one, and Marc Almond's backing vocals are sorely missed. Balance dedicates "A Cold Cell" to all the prisoners of the world, as well as those "in prisons of their own making." It's always been a haunting song, and the live version enhances its lonely, melancholic atmosphere. Track six is an accomplished recreation of "Paranoid Inlay" from Musick To Play in the Dark 2, even though the tracklisting on the back of the digipack omits it completely. "Sick Mirrors (Version)" is a meditation on the concept of remote viewing utilizing dense Middle Eastern melodies. The song seamlessly segues into a frighteningly intense version of "A.Y.O.R.," the second of three songs in this set that may have been destined for Coil's long-promised-but-never-delivered Nothing Records album, now referred to as The World Ended a Long Time Ago. "Backwards" ends the set, a joyous psychosexual EBM bacchanalia, with Balance uttering some of his most transgressive lyrics: "Fuck me in reverse/Normal is perverse/Everything's backwards." This disc would be perfect were it not for a rather nagging problem with the mixing, which seems to favor Balance's vocals and pushes much of the music into a muddy, nebulous background. Even with the technical difficulties, Live Three is an essential chronicle of one of Coil's most inspired shows. - Jonathan Dean

Coil's Live Three is a show from Bologna, in 2002. At the time, Thighpaulsandra was on leave from Coil, touring with Spiritualized. In his place, John Balance, Peter Christopherson and Ossian Brown brought in Mike York and Cliff Stapleton. York's Hurdy Gurdy and Stapleton's Breton Pipes bring a wonderful new element to Coil's sound, a subtle feeling that everything is slightly unstable or askew. This time, three otherwise unavailable tracks appear, making this album essential for fans. "Anarcadia: All Horned Animals" is a ritual invocation to the muse, a dark-ambient beginning to the show, similar to the "Zwolf" EP by Coil's alter-ego ELpH. "Sick Mirrors (Version)" is a tribal percussion piece with Middle Eastern melodies and Balance's signature spoken-sung vocals. "Backwards, " the title track to the lost album that was to appear on Trent Reznor's nothing label, is a great groover, with a bouncing bassline and an absolutely ranting Balance in full-command of the stage. Of the unreleased tracks on all four live tracks, this is the best. Definitely worth picking up for both casual and hardcore fans. - James Mason...From Allmusic

ANS (2003...c) [Coil...CD]

01 Untitled
02 Untitled
03 Untitled

Notes...

First sold at Mutek 2003 concert in Montreal, Canada
Originally came in a black C-shell case.
Came in the Live Box.

Review...

In addition to some suitably odd printed art cards and scrying mirrors, every live box set also includes a black plastic clamshell containing this, a tour-only CD available at some of Coil's most recent shows. ANS contains three long tracks of about 20 minutes each, consisting solely of tones made with the Russian ANS synthesizer. Invented by Eugeny Murzin in 1938, only one ANS synthesizer has ever actually been built, and it sits neglected and obscure, collecting dust in the basement of Moscow State University since 1958. Coil were given access to experiment and record with the strange machine, and their experiments are chronicled on this disc. ANS is a "photoelectric" instrument that produces music via a completely unique process. The user must inscribe a series of line drawings that represent visible sound waves onto a series of glass discs. The shape, location and nature of the drawings determines the sound that the synthesizer produces, which encompasses the entire range of audible sound, 720 pure tones. Unfortunately, the fascinating history and musical theory behind the ANS instrument is ultimately far more interesting than the music Coil has managed to make with it. While there are many dramatic points of convergence buried within these abstract, long-form compositions, the overall effect is of dilettantes noodling around with an unfamiliar piece of equipment that reportedly takes years to properly master. Though there are some parts of ANS that are reminiscent of Time Machines, none of these pieces has the trance-inducing intensity of that album's minimalist drones. Reportedly, Coil are remixing and expanding ANS into an official double album release scheduled for later this year. Perhaps with a bit of the signature Coil touch added to these naked tones, this material will come alive. As it stands, ANS is a fascinating but musically non-compelling tangent into the avant-garde realm of theoretical music. - Jonathan Dean

The Restitution Of Decayed Intelligence (2003...d) [Coil...10'']

01 Untitled
02 Untitled

Review...

If anyone could make something as dry and academic as Musique Concrête into intense, ferociously sexy ear candy, it would have to be Peter Cristopherson and John Balance. This release is the duo's contribution to Beta-Lactam Ring Records' terrific Lactamase series: a subscription series of twelve 10" vinyl records by some of today's best and brightest underground, avant-garde and esoteric musical projects. The series has included some amazing releases from Edward Ka-Spel, Volcano the Bear and Tony Conrad, but the most highly anticipated release is certainly Coil's masterful grand finale to the series. Coil's two-sided 10" occupies a unique place in their discography. It is a truly awe-inspiring tangent into the rarefied realm of musique concrête abstractionists such as Iannis Xenakis, Tod Dockstader and Luc Ferrari. There has always been an element of these musical progenitors in Coil's musick, but their penchant for structured, vocal-driven "songs" have prevented them from ever fully engaging their abstruse tendencies. Both sides of the 10" use the same basic sounds and techniques, but the sculpturing takes different forms on either side. Side A, or "The Restitution of Decayed Intelligence I," introduces the sound palette: a chorus of digital buzzes, stutters and skips that occupy the soundfield at different pitches and volumes. This music is very dimensional, seeming to fly into one's ears at a myriad of different angles. Soon, the high-end stutters are joined by a series of quasi-rhythmic metallic throbs, like the alternating whirr of a flying saucer engine. These elements are then edited, overdubbed and sculpted into dramatic convergences of sound that alternately pierce, arouse and frighten. So many faintly recognizable sounds can be heard in this midst of these abstractions, but the listener cannot discern which are placed there intentionally and which are an accident of subjectivity. A chorus of bone saws, a squeaking hinge, high-pitched shrieking, a mutated voice, swooping metallic shards, granular static: all of these sounds sneak out of the noise over the course of the piece. Side B, or "The Restitution of Decayed Intelligence II," uses the same set of aural phenomena, but this time snatches of recognizable melody become obvious as the piece unfolds. Jhon Balance's warped vocal hiccups from track two of The Remote Viewer are re-used, albeit in a completely inscrutable form, sounding like a swarm of bees frantically trying to communicate with the human race. Halfway through, there is a shocking increase in volume and intensity as the piece gains momentum. It is here that we see Coil's personality come through; this piece, however chaotic, has the same epic sweep as their Love's Secret Domain-era acid house excercises, and all of the dark, hedonistic atmosphere. This 10" manages to be both a brilliantly mature dip into abstract electronic music, and twisted, uber-Pagan ritual musick. After more than 20 years, Coil is still perfectly balancing this strange dichotomy and creating something wholly unexpected and wonderful with each new release. - Jonathan Dean

Live Two (2003...e) [Coil...CD]

01 Something / Higher Being's Command
02 Amethyst Deceivers
03 What Kind of Animal Are You?
04 Blood from the Air
05 The Green Child
06 Constant Shallowness Leads To Evil

Notes...

Recorded in Moscow on September 5, 2001.
Also issued in the Live Box.

Review...

Coil's Moscow performance in the Fall of 2001 is documented here, soon after their brief stateside visit. Like the NYC show, the Moscow performance went under the banner "Constant Shallowness Leads to Evil," a tight, energetic performance highlighting Coil's most confrontational material. This is my personal favorite of the four periods of Coil's live shows, simply because Coil seemed at this stage to be perfectly in control of their audience, skillfully heightening tension and confounding expectations, all the while subliminally projecting their bizarre brand of personal empowerment propaganda onto the unwitting observers. This Moscow performance seems to be the absolute zenith of the "Constant Shallowness" show, which is why the bad mix on tracks like "What Kind of Animal Are You?" is very disappointing indeed. The officially sanctioned bootleg CD-R recording of the NYC show actually boasts superior audio, which is surprising considering Coil's usually scrupulous attention to their production fidelity. Still, this performance is very impressive, especially the pitch-perfect rendition of Horse Rotorvator's "Blood From the Air." The final, apocalyptic blowout of "Constant Shallowness Leads to Evil" begins with Balance satirically answering some vicious rumors printed in a Russian publication: "We've heard that some of you may have read that we eat human flesh. However, we only do this on religious holidays." Coil then launch into a lengthy noise assault specifically formulated to exorcise you of demons and brainwash you of all your previous learning, leaving you vulnerable for Coil's subliminal psychobabble. "God please fuck my mind for good!" screams a wrecked Balance, stealing a line from Captain Beefheart's "Making Love to a Vampire With a Monkey on My Knee." If you manage to make it to the end of this exhausting set with your sanity intact, you may truly grasp Coil's final motto "Persistence is All." - Jonathan Dean

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Live One (2003...f) [Coil...2xCD]

disc 1 [Recorded At The Royal Festival Hall, 02-04-00]

01 Everything Keeps Dissolving
02 Queens Of The Circulating Library
03 Chasms

disc 2 [Recorded At Sonar Festival in Barcelona, 17-06-00]

01 Everything Keeps Dissolving
02 Amethyst Deceivers
03 Circulating
04 The Universe Is A Haunted House/Chasms
05 Elves

Notes...

Disc A recorded at the Royal Festival Hall on April 2, 2000.
Disc B recorded at Sonar festival in Barcelona on June 17, 2000.
Also issued in the Live Box.

Review...

The last in the live series is a 2-CD set beautifully packaged in a foldout digipack. The two discs document the first two Coil performances of the new millennium, focusing on their Time Machines material. It must have been terribly exciting for the audience at the Royal Festival Hall in April of 2000 to hear the opening tones of "Everything Keeps Dissolving," this being Coil's first true live concert other than some sallow, abortive attempts made in the early 80's. Coil no doubt practiced for months, as they show no signs of unease in unveiling their polished live presence. Disc one originally saw limited release as Time Machines Live only available with mail order copies of Musick to Play in the Dark 2. It's swell for this material to be widely available, as it is truly a great concert and a flawless recording. At this early stage in Coil's performances, John Balance had not yet adopted the dancing, screaming, extroverted lunatic personality he was to unveil in later shows. Therefore, the three tracks that make up the London show contain no live singing, just a series of enraptured electronic oscillations that twist around the brain, wiping out all thought but an extreme sense of dislocation and confusion. "Queens of the Circulating Library" utilizes samples of Thighpaulsandra's opera-singing mum Dorothy Lewis, together with digital arpeggiations and sexy purrs from a wounded synthesizer. "Chasms" flirts close to Tangerine Dream territory, a swirling circulation of warm synthesizer tones that unfold like a Russian science fiction film. Disc two comprises Coil's terrific performance at Barcelona's Sonar festival in June of 2000. It repeats the same songs from disc one, but adds three new songs to the setlist, including the fourth and final permutation of "Amethyst Deceivers." Bill Breeze plays viola throughout the entrancing set, adding some beautiful neo-classical flourishes. "The Universe is a Haunted House," a line taken directly from Burroughs' Naked Lunch, is present in a much more nascent version than the one heard on Live Four. Unfortunately, this disc suffers from two problems. First, the audio source used for this release was not made from the soundboard, but is rather a recording by a member of the audience. While pains have been taken to clean up the sound, the audio does suffer from the technical problems inherent in bootleg recordings, including annoying audience chatter and trebly distortions. Second, although the digipack lists six tracks, the CD only contains five tracks, the last two apparently having been accidentally merged. Still, this is a rather impressive bootleg recording, and these problems can easily be forgiven and the concert still enjoyed. We hear Jhon Balance step to the front for the first time, delivering a series of blood-curdling screams on "Elves," once again making a play for the title of the most warped vocalist in music today. - Jonathan Dean

Images...

bootleg [cd 2]
inlay [cd 2]

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Live Box (2003...g) [Coil...6xCD/1xCD-R]

Contents...

Live One [2XCD]
Live Two
Live Three
Live Four
ANS
Megalithomania! [CD-R]

Review...

When it was announced that Coil would play their first live show in North America on August 18, 2001, I was shocked by what seemed like an incredible series of synchronicities. I had long considered Coil to be one of my favorite bands, but I thought there would be little or no chance of ever seeing them play live. Though they had recently begun playing select concerts at some classy venues and festivals in Europe, they just seemed far too shadowy, eccentric and English to ever grace American shores. Strangely, the day announced for the concert was not only my birthday, but my 23rd birthday, a number commonly involved with synchronicity, and a number often mythologized by Coil themselves. Also, before hearing the announcement, I had already planned a trip to New York City to celebrate my birthday. It seemed as if mysterious forces had aligned in to make certain that I would not miss this Coil performance. However, I did not have very high expectations for the concert itself. Sure, Coil were mind-bending and transcendent on record, but how could their complex, studio-hermetic sound possibly translate into a meaningful live show? Coil's live performance is a revelation; a powerful, dramatic explosion of dynamic energy, every bit as impressive as their recorded output, but somehow even more potent and overwhelming. The absolutely massive sound achieved by Sleazy's digital programming, Thighpaulsandra's soaring synthesizers and Jhon Balance's possessed outbursts clearly needed proper documenting on record. Recently, Coil inaugurated a backwards-unfolding series of four live CDs, each documenting a different "age" of their constantly evolving live show. To those willing to shell out nearly $200, Threshold House also offered a limited box set of all four discs, together with two extra CD-Rs and "art objects" allegedly "loaded with magickal intent". - Jonathan Dean

Images...

box spine
box underside

Megalithomania! (2003...h) [Coil...CD-R]

01 Megalithomania!

Notes...

Recording of Coil's live appearance as part of the Megalithomania! Festival
on October 12th 2002 at The Conway Hall, London.
The single track is a 40 minute variation/permutation
on "The Universe is a Haunted House".

This limited edition release was available only as part
of a mail order box set of the Live series.
The box also included the ANS tour edition CD and various art objects.

Review...

With each box set, Coil includes a CD-R of their performance at the Megalithomania! Festival. This disc cannot be purchased separately, and is available only as part of the limited edition box. It's a very nice bonus indeed, as this performance is unique among Coil's live history, and marks a sort of turning point for the group. Megalithomania! was a celebration of sacred sites and standing stones as expressed through history, folklore, art and sound. Basically, everything that Julian Cope was on about in his mammoth tome "The Modern Antiquarian." For this special event, Coil performed a long, drawn-out permutation on "The Universe is a Haunted House," turning the piece into a slowly evolving ambient sound sculpture involving the ghostly sound of water droplets, quietly droning synths, and a particularly spectral vocal improvisation from Balance. As reported by many people who attended the event, there seemed to be a strange rift between Balance and Sleazy, evidenced by John's agitated screaming: "Why are you here? Why are you here?" Balance's statement that "we are the alien" could be read as a tribute to the extra-terrestrial builders of Stonehenge, or as a further statement of his growing alienation from his long-time partner. A few days after this performance, Peter and John announced that while Coil would continue, they would no longer describe themselves as a couple. Sad, indeed, but these personal matters cannot overshadow a very unique and powerful performance. As the tension and mutation compounds over the 40-minute length, Balance's alien incantations fight for prominence with Thighpaulsandra's thick slabs of stoned-Druid synthesizer. The recording is spotless, highlighting all of the ghostly minutiae of this one-of-a-kind Coil show. - Jonathan Dean