Coil's work explored themes related to the occult, sexuality, alchemy, and drugs while influencing genres such as gothic rock, neofolk and dark ambient.
After departing from Some Bizzare, Coil established their own record label, Threshold House, through which they produced and released Love's Secret Domain (1991).
Financial difficulties slowed the group's work in the early 1990s before they returned to the project on releases such as Astral Disaster (1999), and the Musick to Play in the Dark series composed of Vol.
[7] 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.
[10] In 1978, John Balance (born Geoff[rey] Burton; also known as Rushton, his stepfather's surname) 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.
[12] 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.
[14] Balance, who had attended the University of Sussex for a short time and participated in Brian Williams' Lustmord project,[15] returned in London to live with Christopherson—with whom a romantic partnership had begun.
[17] 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.
[22][23] 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.
[22][27] The band's official recording debut, an extended play titled How to Destroy Angels, was released on the Good Friday (20 April) of 1984 by a Belgian-based label L.A.Y.L.A.H.
[15]: 49 [28] 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.
[33] Scatology was released in early 1985 with a 1984 copyright date by the band's own label, Force & Form, and K.422 (a Some Bizzare Records sublabel), to mainly positive feedback.
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.
[43] Gold Is the Metal (With the Broadest Shoulders) 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.
[45] Love's Secret Domain (abbreviated LSD) followed in 1991 as the next "proper" Coil album, although a few minor releases had been produced since Horse Rotorvator.
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.
[41] 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 [Balance] performing on stage with about 20 or 30 dancing boys, which probably won't get played on MTV, in fact!
The pre-Coil aliases, Zos Kia and Sickness of Snakes, formed the foundation of a style that would evolve to characterize their initial wave of releases.
[51] Much like the pre-Coil aliases, Coil's series of side projects represented a diverse basis from which the group evolved a different style of sound.
The second single, Summer Solstice: Bee Stings, also featured performances by Breeze, and also included the industrial-noise song "A Warning from the Sun (For Fritz)", which was dedicated to a friend of Balance and Christopherson's who had committed suicide earlier that year.
The single also features the song "Amethyst Deceivers", later reworked and performed throughout most of Coil's tour—it was eventually re-made into an alternate version on the LP The Ape of Naples.
The fourth single, Winter Solstice: North, also includes a track sung by McDowall, and is partially credited to the side project Rosa Mundi.
2 followed in September 2000, and Coil began to perform live more intensively, a period that also included writing the music for Black Antlers in between a series of mini-tours.
Constant Shallowness Leads To Evil, a noise-driven experimental album reminiscent of Christopherson's work with Throbbing Gristle, was first sold at a live performance in September 2000.
This change in sound was reflected in their live performances, as songs like "Ostia" and "Slur" were slowed down from their original pace, as well as re-recordings of "Teenage Lightning" and "Amethyst Deceivers" that were later released on The Ape Of Naples.
In August 2006, the rare CD-R releases The Remote Viewer and Black Antlers were "sympathetically remastered" and expanded into two-disc versions, which included new and recently remixed material.
[74] Including quirks such as "art objects", sigil-like autographs and even stains of blood in the packaging of their albums, Coil claimed that this made their work more personal for true fans, turning their records into something akin to occult artifacts.
Coil explicitly stated the influence of such non-musical sources as William Burroughs, Aleister Crowley, Brion Gysin and Austin Spare.
Rock musicians and groups Coil have expressed interest in are: Angus Maclise, Captain Beefheart, Flipper, Leonard Cohen, Lou Reed, Nico, Pere Ubu, Butthole Surfers, Napalm Death, The Birthday Party, The Velvet Underground and The Virgin Prunes.
[42][60][71][81][82][24] Coil expressed an interest in the Russian composer Igor Stravinsky, and used a sample from his ballet Rite of Spring on the Horse Rotorvator song "The Anal Staircase".