Okay, Coil fans. Legendary duo John Balance (also of Psychic TV) and Peter Christopherson (veteran of Throbbing Gristle) are here in a just-unearthed performance from 2002. Experimental live master class is in session.
Robin Rimbaud, aka Scanner and a London icon himself, checks in with this one. It’s a bootleg MiniDV 19 years in the making. (Thanks to ever-eagle-eyed David Abravanel for catching this one.)
A show commissioned by the Barbican Centre in London to accompany the exhibition in the art gallery of Game On, exploring the history of computer games. I was invited to curate an evening of music to reflect on these themes within electronic music. Acts that performed on the night were Plaid, Coil, Mouse on Mars and SND.
The original footage was recorded on a MiniDV camcorder, so the quality is rather lacking by contemporary standards, was hand-held for the duration of the show, and stored on two separate tapes, hence a little gap some way into the performance. Having said that, there’s little other footage of this performance, and I feel it’s of value historically. And believe me, the challenge of simply importing this footage is just too complex to share here!
Only Connect: Play Barbican Centre
London 27 April 2002Set List
00:00 Anarcadia: All Horned Animals
06:13 Amethyst Deceivers (Version 2)
14:29 Slur
19:59 A Cold Cell
26:53 Cher Interlude
27:22 Sick Mirrors
40:01 An Unearthly Red (live debut)
https://archive.org/details/coil-barbican
Bonus: come for the Coil, stay for the Mouse on Mars! From the same lineup, a fiercely energetic and deliciously enigmatic outing from Jan and Andi (with video behind them, too):
Seems Robin is deep into grungy archived live documentation – for instance, “Low grade, out of focus, distorted, monochrome and as magnificent as ever” a s The Fall live at Maxwell’s on 4 June 1981.
Oh yeah, and just remember everyone – book. live. acts. Electronic ones included. But for instance:
Now this Coil meanwhile makes me want to rig up the gear in some new configuration, grab the microphone, go crazy, and practice hard as hell.