COIL - The Ape Of Naples

How difficult it is to talk about this record, the (literally) last album released by that extraordinary hotbed of research and experimentation known as Coil, born back in 1983 and immediately emerging as the flagship act of the fervent esoteric-industrial underground linked to names such as Current 93, Nurse With Wound and Psychic Tv.

Difficult to talk about, impossible to listen to with the right emotional detachment and without thinking of him, the man who gave soul and voice to Coil, steering its inspirations through countless, sudden shifts in style and sound: that John Balance, born Geff Rushton, whose absence is still searing. A charismatic figure, a personality as complex and unstable as his music, his life was cut short on 13 November 2004, at the age of 42, by a banal domestic accident and his decade-long struggle with alcohol.

An absurd, sudden death that left both his fans and his fellow musicians and friends in a state of disbelief and disorientation. His was a life and a career that still had so much to give, and the sudden void left in the wake of his passing remains, and will remain, impossible to fill.

There were many new tracks Balance and his lifelong partner Peter Christopherson were working on right up until that 13th of November, when everything was abruptly cut short. And in the year that separated that cursed day from the release of this album, having at least partly come to terms with the loss of his friend and partner and having successfully reunited with his (very) old comrades Throbbing Gristle, Christopherson also worked tirelessly to bring to light the final testimonies of John Balance's artistic activity: the live album "And The Ambulance Died in His Arms", a forthcoming DVD, and this "The Ape Of Naples" (the reason behind this bizarre title remains a mystery for now) - an album that gathers a number of entirely unreleased tracks and presents, for the first time in official form, pieces that had previously only circulated on various bootlegs (including one recorded in 1996 at Trent Reznor's studio in New Orleans). And Christopherson's work, a true genius at the mixing desk, has made this collection sound as compact and cohesive as a genuine new album.

Coil were shedding their skin once again: after a decade of incredible electronic exploration, they were now experimenting with a more "live" sound (helped in part by new members Mike York, Cliff Stapleton and Simon Norris), a strange, undulating sound, at once dense and minimal, one that had already characterised such outstanding releases as "The Remote Viewer" (2003) and "Black Antlers" (2004).

And so here are the slow, astonished unfoldings of these alien, hallucinated "songs": the opening "Fire Of The Mind" and "Cold Cell", "Triple Sun" and new versions of classics such as "Amethyst Deceiver" and "Teenage Lightning" - all extraordinary episodes that carry us into that sensory dimension belonging only to Coil, one that only they have explored so thoroughly, down to the last detail. A dimension of dream and hallucination, of stretched-out moments, where reassuring, familiar signs and places are subtly warped until they become new and unrecognisable: hence "Tattooed Man", in which the chameleonic Coil disguise their dreamlike art in the clothes of a folk ballad complete with accordion, not far removed from certain works by their friend Marc Almond. And then there's the delirious "It's In My Blood", the horror-nightmare of "I Don't Get It", and the digital suggestions of "Heavens Blade". And closing this final journey into John Balance's world, here is Coil at their most ascetic and at their best on the beautiful "Amber Rain", and the long, enveloping ritual of "Going Up", intoned by the pale voice of guest François Testory (better known as Sarrazine).

These aren't songs, they're hypnotic, mysterious objects floating weightless and centreless in an abyssal void, restless forms in constant mutation, shaped by the magnetism of John Balance's voice.

And this testament of an album is one of the most accomplished expressions of Coil's art, an album that brings an extraordinary career to the best possible close; but of course it will also, and above all, be remembered as the last opportunity to share in the visions of Geff Rushton, a man who fed his life and his art with his own excesses, turning them into milestones of an intense personal and spiritual journey as well as a musical one. A journey that comes to an end in this album of great, anguished and luminous beauty.

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30/04/2026