Like the Stolen And Contaminated Songs after-feast of Coil’s third album Love’s Secret Domain, Gold Is The Metal gave sanctuary to some of the working remnants and escapees of Scatology and (the never seems to be getting a reissue) Horse Rotovator. This compilation album, constituted mostly of unused out-takes and demos from the latter, lacks the solidity that Stolen And Contaminated Songs had.
Its sounds feel more sketchy, pencilled-in, a parade of instrumental markers to the creative process rather than properly realised entities in their own right. As such, sonically this isn’t versed with the consistency you’d find in a proper Coil release, the pieces tend to rub awkwardly against each other; some flounder unresolved (they are essentially unfinished workings anyway), and a few like “Broken Wheel” have sadly become dated relics. That being said, I’m not saying there isn’t plenty still to love here — far from it.
The apocalyptical pull of “Paradisiac” and that dishwasher-scrunched buzz-saw amputee sound of “Golden Hole” that would inform Horse Rotovator’s “Penetralia” are pretty impressive. The stunning “For Us They Will” is a tether-less castaway, and along with the nimble-footed “Either His, Or Yours” shines with a raw brilliance as the carnality-cusping voice of John Balance snips at those snarling sonics, plucking prophet-like to a negative sun, yelling “You have to burn in order to shine”, wanting to bite the hand that feeds him to an adrenalised gunshot percussive.
The scary quiver of that Hellraiser sketch too, seemly perfectly formed, bathed in the self-same neo-classical glint the ascendant waver and warped waltz of “Cardinal Points” possesses. An aesthetic that evesnongs that Angelic Conversation soundtrack that would sneak in there in the ’90s (and kick-started my love for the band). A melancholic ambering that was destined to leak Ouroboros-like to the band’s last recordings.
Collecting…connecting… cultivating… the band’s antenna always seemed to be searching out ways to bend modernity back on itself, prey to an older consciousness. As such, Gold Is The Metal has got me re-playing, dot-joining its many components to so much of Coil’s discography, seeing where the contents have leaked into future use beyond the obvious connections of this track being the demo of that.
That broody “Dark River” track on Love’s Secret Domain is not dissimilar to some of the more moody fayre incised therein; also the psychoactive malfunctions of “Metal In The Head” does seem to harbour a distant call to the future explorations on Worship The Glitch. Maybe I’m getting carried away with the Frankenstein re-distribution of its bits’n’pieces — that ghostly shot of trumpet here or rotary sliver of feedback there; but without a doubt these were base elements Coil knew how to turn golden.
-Michael Rodham-Heaps-
