Customer Reviews

Love's Secret Domain

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Coil's not much interested in easy listening. "Gold Is the Metal" is the only other Coil I have, so that's all I can compare it with. On Gold, the songs are offered take it or leave it; some are quite challenging. (Boy in a Suitcase, frinstance)

LSD is smoothly crafted for lounge listening, for example the silky Things Happen. (Or, perhaps some chanteuse might come over for a cigarette?) The cd is subtitled, "Out of Light Cometh Darkness." And I believe that the painting on the cover may be the face of a lion (king of the beasts). Darkness, the king of beasts, the didgeridoo, the cacophany of Disco Hospital--Coil brings these out of the light. LSD is the bomb.

I believe the cacophony that begins this cd (and the song Disco Hospital) is actually taken from the 1957/58 electronic composition "Artikulation" by the composer György Ligeti (b. 1923 in Translvania). Ligeti's most famous piece [non-electronic] is "Lux Aeterna" (Eternal Light), which is on the "2001 a Space Odyssey" soundtrack. Perhaps an additional explanation of the "out of light cometh darkness" motto...

Wow. There is so much going on in these songs I don't know where to start except to say that it is a crime that I must purchase all my Coil CDs at inflated prices from overseas. Anyone from a record company reading this?? PLEASE reprint their albums on US soil so that I can stop pumping money into the pockets of British music execs. However, the fact that I willingly pay... for each of their CDs is a testament to how far I would go for music this great.

I don't really know what to call Coil. They might... fit into a genre I heard called "sampledelic" the other day. They bring in so much from so many varied sources that it's no wonder they're nestled in my CD changer right between Ministry and Johnny Cash.

In order to have this review be useful to readers, I would generally try and categorize what sorts of listeners might buy this CD. In the case of Coil, there are so many cultures woven into their music that it's hard not to be inclusive and say "everyone would like this!" But in the interest of experimentation I will try. This is a good CD for you if you like: flamenco, lounge, industrial, dance, trance, IDM, African, gypsy, goth, ambient, fusion, Middle Eastern, or Indian musics. If none of those categories interest you in the slightest, you might not enjoy this very much. But for everyone else, this is a solid buy.

My copy of Love's Secret Domain was obtained years ago with a hoot of realized good luck in the used stacks at Orpheum in Seattle. My best friend had a copy when he was staying with me, and we had lost contact, so this CD is a great rediscovery and a missing link between my goth-teen past and my techno-adult present. Tastewise, it nestles nicely on the shelf between my Nitzer Ebb CD I stole back then and the Autechre CD I ordered the other day. The influence of this recording is obvious, a mixture of trebly textures and house beats as well as more unique rhythms and melodies. 10 years old, I don't know why its still OOP in USA.

This album was created for and still effectively used for the enjoyment of powerful psychotropics, it is multi dimentional in nature, at times frightening, other times, soothing, bizzare and VERY cerebral. Incredibly visual. I have listned to some out of this world music in my life, and this one takes the cake.

If you have a very open mind, and can listen to occasional cacophony of bizzare audio samples, and believe that you can not only handle the sound of a backward suction gun slurping your brain from your skull but truly enjoy it, as well as enjoy loosing your mind for an hour or two then this album is for you. A veritable tapestry of sound, an experience not for the weak minded or shallow.

If you want a dance album, look elsewhere, aside from tracks 7-10, you will mostly be in a daze, and incapable of dancing to this.

I love this album, and would LOVE to find a full sized image of the album cover as well!!! Worth every penny, pound sterling, or euor!

If you like electronic music of ANY sort, buy this. Now. It's worth it. This album flows like a trip around the Tree of Life, if said Tree were also a rave in Hell. A few of my favourite moments: 'Dark River' is a quiet, sinuously flowing instrumental. 'Where Even the Darkness is Something to See' reverberates with digeridoo sounds and uses them very effectively, bringing a wild, primal grace to the song. 'Windowpane's vocals are creepy and smooth, the kind of sounds that insinuate into your head. 'Chaostrophy' begins with layers of noise, television fuzz that seems to coalesce into an alost tender melody. The title track ends the whole thing, not with a graceful dropoff like most cds do, but with a brick in the head, a viciously sensual hymn to love in all it's volatility and obsession.
Again. Worth it. If you've never heard Coil before, this will blow your mind.

Just as the clever title "Loves Secret Domain" (LSD) states, this is a mind expanding release of electronic music. Weird samples, techno beats and Video game sounds collide with catchy synths and trancelike rhythms. I dislike most techno, and don't really favor the current EBM trends in Industrial music, but this album is one of my favorites of anything associated with those genres. Coil is a innovative group which is comprised of some former members of Industrial pioneers Throbbing Gristle. However, compared to other post-Gristle projects, I think that they really took the adventurous spirit and went somewhere with it. I do not think that (former Gristle leader Geneis P'Orridge's) Psychic TV's "Acid house era" material compares evenly with albums such as this.

This CD has a lot of personal memories tied up in it for me, hours and hours spent, well spent in another frame of mind listening to this (when I was younger of course). Not that I would ever recommend being in such a state of mind, but if one were in such a state then this would be one of the best CD's to listen to!

When listening to this now you can see it had a total influence on bands like Aphex Twin, however no one (including Coil) has ever come close to making such a sound again. Its a crazy disco lounge ride through hell from start to finsih.

As a DJ you will find three great tracks worth club play (even though I do play some of the other tracks early on in a night), "The Snow", "Love Secret Domain" and "Windowpane" are all great songs to fill your dance floor, both "Love Secret Domain" and "Windowpane" have to be on my all time top 50 requested song list.

Any industrial type DJ should own this CD, as well as most any type of music fan, its just a great CD.

This is not an easy album to come by, but I've been blessed with finding used copies of it twice!
Coil lays down some industrial weirdness on this album: creepy ("Love's Secret Domain"), disjointed ("Things Happen"), and tripped-out ("Windowpane" -- if you don't get that, I'm not explaining it...). Also, there's that didgeridoo floating through a couple of the songs like an aboriginie wandered through the studio while the band was cutting the tracks, seemingly out-of-place in an industrial song but it sounds good anyway. Kudos to anyone who can pull off the use of that instrument in their songs (unless you're Dead Can Dance, then it makes sense).

LSD changed electronic music. It was also here that you find Coil always had its creativity to do it before music had the means and equipment to actually fullfill the creative bugs in John Balance and Peter Christopherson.

Acid House in some songs and this was made in 1991. When in American music scene Acid House would take nearly 2 more years to ever surface at the head of the Desert party or "rave" scene. Then again the pioneers like Orb, FSOL, Fila Brazillia and Richard James of aphex Twin had not yet truely discoverd what creativity they had to utilize untill Coil graced the universal unconcious.

Contributions from Coil are historic, innovative and mind bendingly gorgeous. try also Coil's "Horse Rotorvator" which is still my favorite and now 18 year old dark, avant garde masterpiece.

everything that Coil is comes together on this album. it's everything...dark, sexual, sleazy, spiritual, magickal...musickal. a dark cabaret of the mind...spanish guitars, other realms...the night...seashores...hemispheres...the bird's eye...ancient cities. everything that lays dormant in the earth and the mind and heart come alive on this record!