He was born Geoffrey Laurence Burton on 16th February 1962 in
Mansfield, Nottinghamshire, later adopting the Rushton surname of his
stepfather, and was educated at Lord Willliams School. He studied voice
and vocal technique with Saral Bohm, wife of the physicist David Bohm.
He was a member of Psychic TV, Zos Kia, and Current 93, and in 1983
founded Coil with Throbbing Gristle co-founder Peter Christopherson.
They embarked together on one of the most enduring and fruitful
art/life partnerships in music. Balance was a natural occultist from
youth -- he has left amusing accounts of his intensive astral
experiences while still a public schoolboy.
He became a serious student of all occult literature, and drew on this
in his music, artfully fusing esoterics with a succession of musical
forms and styles over more than two decades. The imagery and symbolism
of his lyrics were however entirely his own -- he never resorted to
plundering the symbolic language of others, though he enjoyed
occasional veiled references. His output is all the more rich for his
originality, making him a primary source in his own right, with
passionate fans among occultists and pagans of all persuasions. His
vocal technique was relentlessly experimental -- where many singers
settle on a signature style and vocal range, he continually pushed the
limits of expression to find fresh outlets for his visions.
The output of Coil ranges from the avant-garde (including soundtracks
for experimental filmmaker Derek Jarman), to acerbic reflections of
passing trends in popular music (such as the brilliantly sardonic
Love¹s Secret Domain album), to experimental neoclassical and folk (as
with the Solstice/Equinox series), to extended excursions into pure
electronica (like the recent Musick to Play in the Dark albums).
Many bands and composers have cited Coil as an influence. Balance
frequently collaborated with others, as guest artist, remixer and
producer. Commissioned work by Coil includes a soundtrack for Clive
Barker's Hellraiser (rejected by the studio as too frightening), and
important remixes of Nine Inch Nails (see the title sequence music for
the film Seven, and the album Further Down the Spiral). After an
initial appearance in Berlin in 1983, Coil was a studio group until
they premiered a sophisticated live show at London¹s Royal Festival
Hall in 2000, commencing a highly successful series of tours that
tested and proved Balance¹s abilities as a performer. Balance was a
gifted writer whose work remains to be collected and published.
A connoisseur of all things strange and beautiful, over the years he
and Peter Christopherson built the important Threshold House collection
of Austin Osman Spare and Aleister Crowley artworks, often loaning
paintings to shows. Balance struggled all his life with the twin
diseases of depression and alcoholism -- the latter contributed to his
accidental death -- but he drew on this pain as well as his great joy
in living to produce art that was all the more true, immediate and
poignantly relevant. An account of his life and work is David Keenan's
England's Hidden Reverse: The Secret History of the Esoteric
Underground (London: SAF Publishing, 2003). A man of immense talent,
learning, charm and generosity, he is survived by his ex-partner and
lifelong collaborator Peter Christopherson, and his partner, the artist
Ian Johnstone.
