Photo by Seze

MAGICK & MUSIC: COIL’S DREW MCDOWALL EXPLAINS RITUAL AND THE CREATIVE PROCESS

from ELECTRONIC BEATS

Coil’s cult-like fanbase knows that the band, which fluctuated in membership over its more than twenty years of existence, was deeply entrenched in occult doctrines and practices passed down from Aleister Crowley, William Burroughs and Brion Gysin. The group was also a proponent of Austin Osman Spare, a painter and occultist whom McDowall credits with influencing his body of work on a subtextual level. “His whole concept of ‘Neither-Neither’”—the state of the “total vacuity” of the conscious mind, which is also a concept central to Buddhism, yoga and tantric practices—“is a really powerful thing. It’s the practice of thinking about disparate, contradictory notions.” One of the goals of imbuing artistic practice with philosophies like Spare’s is to treat compositions, performances and productions more as spiritual tools than as musical pieces.

Photo by Seze

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Magick & Music: Coil’s Drew McDowall Explains Ritual And The Creative Process