MAN IS THE ANIMAL: A COIL ZINE #1 & #2

 

TITLE - MAN IS THE ANIMAL: A COIL ZINE

EDITED BY - CORMAC PENTECOST

GENRE - THE BAND COIL, THEIR MUSIC, INFLUENCES & LEGACY [INCL. THEMES OF MAGICK, ESOTERICA, HAUNTOLOGY etc.]

COUNTRY OF ORIGIN - UNITED KINGDOM

A5/PERFECT-BOUND/60 PAGES/FULL COLOUR

PRICE - £6.75 + SHIPPING FROM TEMPORAL BOUNDARY PRESS

 

A full-colour, multimedia zine about the experimental band British band Coil, with articles on their music, poetry inspired by the band members, and deep dives into their lyrics and influences. Started in 2021, it has now published two issues.

Produced by the Temporal Boundary Press stable, which also publishes "Waiting For You: A Detectorists Zine", and is affiliated to the lauded Folk Horror Revival & Urban Wyrd project, (the only recommendation one needs) “Man Is The Animal” is a fanzine fully dedicated to Coil. But this is no half-arsed fan-club pamphlet. Editor Cormac Pentecost’s editorial piece in issue 1 is a statement of intent: this is not a “love-letter to a defunct band…but a means of exploring latent potentialities”. The zine explores how Coil’s legacy has only just begun to be understood and actualised.

Various and diverse contributors proffer articles that primarily explore Coil’s music, but these also touch on magick, hauntology, liminality and the occult. Notables such as John Dee, Aleister Crowley and William Burroughs are invoked often. As I said earlier, this is a deep dive into Coil’s esoteric influences, and not for the casual reader, but long-term fans will find much to enhance their enjoyment of the band’s music.

As a Coil novice, Sean Oscar’s deeply personal article in issue 1, “A Hauntology of Coil”, resonated with me, as he describes discovering Coil, long after their demise, as a relic of the past which keeps coming back in the present like a ghost with unfinished business. Other highlights include “Four Poems For John Balance” by Jeremy Reed in issue 2; these are haunting and vivid nightmare-eulogies for lead singer John Balance’s early and unexpected death - an all-too recognisable urban landscape of coffee shops and despair.

“Man Is The Animal” is nicely produced and easy to read with clear printing and evocative artwork throughout. It is probably aimed more at the seasoned Coil acolyte, but new adventurers on the journey will find much to enjoy and to inspire them. Being part of the Folk Horror Revival stable, there is a lot of overlap with the themes that they explore, so the zine is also fervently recommended for enthusiasts of FHR and all that is associated with it.