Church of Industrial Music: Coil - Love's Secret Domain

Though this album pre-dates anything I've covered in these articles so far, this one came a bit later for me, partly because it already wasn't very easy to get a hold of when I got into this stuff. Once I did hear it though, the impact was quite like hearing Skinny Puppy for that first time: mind-blowing. Not that I would necessarily compare them to Puppy otherwise, it would be difficult to compare them to almost anyone, really.

I considered writing about an earlier album of theirs, but decided to stick with the theme so far of first albums I heard from a given band (this may change in later articles). This is apparently considered to be Coil's most commercial album, and it's even been referred to as "techno", though I think most of this release, with the exception of "The Snow" (and possibly "Windowpane"), is pretty far from what most people, especially today, would put under that label. It is worth noting, however, that around the time of, and leading up to, this album, techno was a more niche and experimental genre itself. Even considering that though, there's some pretty far-out stuff here. While much of it wouldn't seem too out of place in, say, some mellower breakcore or stranger IDM releases, most of it isn't exactly dance music, which is what I think most people associate with techno.

That said, I can indeed see why this was considered more "commercial" than their previous releases. While almost all of Coil's major releases have some strange element of musicality about them that at least hints at "real" music, most of their work previous to LSD lacked the catchiness of, say, the title track, or "Windowpane"... with the possible exception of their wonderfully odd cover of "Tainted Love". That is not to say that they lacked talent (far from it!) or even to compare their work to more noise-oriented experimentalism. Though some of their work could probably be called "noise" in the genre sense (see "Chaostrophy" on this album for an example), they tend towards stuff with at least some structure. The opening track to LSD, "Disco Hospital", is a fine example of what I'm talking about here. Although it's quite abstract in one sense, there is a discernable beat and a sort of structure to it. This album also contains some great examples of how Coil often use traditional instruments like cellos and other more traditional instruments to great effect, and on a related note, also contains one of the better examples (imo) of them just plain making beautiful music: "Dark River".

This album, and some videos, are available at brainwashed.com: http://brainwashed.com/common/htdocs/discog/torso181.php?site=coil08

Coil has a pretty large and varied catalog, and my recommendation on where to start would probably vary depending on who I was talking to, but in a generic sense, I think this would be as good a place to start as any. There's some really strange stuff, some rather musical stuff, some stuff that falls somewhere in between, and some that manages to combine the two.

I could babble about Coil at great length, so I'm gonna try to wrap things up before I get too carried away here. I often say that I can't pick a favorite band, because there's just so many that I really love. However, this would definitely be one of the bands on the short list if I had to. The sheer size of Coil's catalog makes it likewise difficult to choose a favorite album of theirs, though again, this would be on the short list.