Editing Time Machines

{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}}
{{Infobox album
| name       = Time Machines
| type       = studio
| artist     = [[Coil (band)|Time Machines]]
| cover      = TimeMachinesEskaton10.jpg
| alt        =
| released   = 26 January 1998
| recorded   =
| venue      =
| studio     =
| genre      = {{flatlist|
*[[Electronic music|Electronic]]
*[[Drone music|drone]]
}}
| length     = 73:32
| label      = [[Eskaton]]
| producer   = [[Coil (band)|Coil]]
| prev_title =
| prev_year  =
| next_title = [[Coil Presents Time Machines]]
| next_year  = 2000
}}

'''''Time Machines''''' is a 1998 studio album by English experimental group [[Coil (band)|Coil]], originally released under the one-off project alias Time Machines. The album was created under the premise of [[Psychedelic music|psychedelic]] [[drone (music)|drone]] pieces named after corresponding [[hallucinogenic drug]]s, "tested and retested" during the album's studio sessions for apparent [[narcotic]] potency. Main member [[John Balance]] also described the album as an attempt to create "temporal slips".<ref name="thewire">{{cite web|title=Coil Interview|last1=Keenan|first1=David|author-link=David Keenan|website=Brainwashed|publisher=Brainwashed Inc.|date=1998-07-21|url=http://brainwashed.com/common/htdocs/publications/coil-1998-the_wire.php?site=coil08|access-date=2017-04-28|df=mdy-all|via=''Brainwashed'' archive}}</ref>

==Background and composition==
''Time Machines'' is composed of four [[Electronic music|electronic]] [[Drone music|drone]] pieces created with modular synthesizers, which as hinted at in their track names are an attempt to recreate the chemically derived psychedelic and narcotic potency of [[Harmine|telepathine]], [[2,5-Dimethoxy-4-ethylamphetamine|DOET]], [[N,N-Dimethyltryptamine|DMT]] and [[psilocybin mushroom]]s (telepathine and DMT being primary components of [[ayahuasca]]). As well as this, Balance intended the album to cause "temporal slips": he commented that the musical effect was demonstrated when the group "listened to it loud [and] lost track of time".<ref name="thewire" /> [[Drew McDowall]] created the original demo for the record, at first inspired by what he saw as a hypnotic state created in [[Music of Tibet|Tibetan music]], but his final idea with Balance and Christopherson was to use filters and oscillators on the tones of the demo to induce trancelike effects.

In a 1998 interview, given to [[David Keenan]] for ''[[The Wire (magazine)|The Wire]]'' magazine, Balance explained the album's concept and intent, inspired by trancelike states:
<blockquote>
One of the interesting things with ''Time Machines'' is that there's a handful of responses which we've had where what happened to the listeners was exactly what we intended to happen. There would be some kind of temporal disruption caused by just listening to the music, just interacting with the music. The drugs thing is actually a hook we hung it on – it originally came out of me and Drew talking that some of the types of music you listen to – sacred musics like Tibetan music or anything with a sacred intent which often is long ceremonial type music which could last for a day or three days or something. There are periods of time in that where you will come out of time. That's the intention of it to go into a trance and achieve an otherness. We thought can we do this sort of electronic punk-primitive? We did demos with a simple mono synth and we managed it. We sat in the room and listened to it loud and we lost track of time – it could be five minutes in or 20 minutes in but you suddenly get this feeling, the hairs on the back of your neck, and you'd realise that you'd had some sort of temporal slip. We fine-tuned, well, filters and oscillators and stuff, to try and maximise this effect. It was that we were after with simple tones – somehow you could slip through.<ref name="thewire" />
</blockquote>

When ''Time Machines'' was first released, the group was initially very conscious that it should not be labeled as a Coil album due to how abstract and different it was compared to previous Coil albums.<ref name="Brainwashed">{{cite web|last=Strachan |first=Guy |url=http://www.brainwashed.com/common/htdocs/publications/coil-2003-terrorizer.php?site=coil08 |title=Coil, "Strangers In The Night" (Terrorizer #110, 2003) |publisher=Brainwashed.com |access-date=2012-03-12}}</ref> However, the group later tended towards regarding ''Time Machines'' a part of the Coil catalog;<ref name="Brainwashed" /> this led the 2000 follow-up live album ''[[Coil Presents Time Machines]]'' to be released as a Coil album.

==Legacy==
A five-disc ''Time Machines'' box set was announced in 1998,<ref>{{cite web|url=http://brainwashed.com/coil/news/news1998.html |title=The News |publisher=Brainwashed.com |access-date=2012-03-12}}</ref><ref name=TimeOutofJoint>{{cite magazine|last=Keenan|first=David|date=September 1998|title=Time Out of Joint|issue=175|url=https://archive.org/details/the-wire-magazine-1998-09-cbz/page/n47|magazine=The Wire|pages=48–53|via=the Internet Archive|issn=0952-0686}}</ref>{{rp|[https://archive.org/details/the-wire-magazine-1998-09-cbz/page/n52 53]}} but never developed. A two-disc version was announced in January 2006 as a future release,<ref>[http://www.thresholdhouse.com/arrivals.html] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070105020437/http://www.thresholdhouse.com/arrivals.html|date=January 5, 2007}}</ref> but this was never expanded on either, although an album by Peter Christopherson, called ''Time Machines II'', was released posthumously. In retrospect, Drew McDowall has remarked that "[p]eople tell me how much of an impact it had on them – which is always pretty surprising."<ref name="vice">{{cite web|url=https://www.vice.com/en/article/almost-20-years-later-coils-drone-masterpiece-is-still-a-record-out-of-time/|title=Almost 20 Years Later, Coil's Drone Masterpiece Is Still a Record Out of Time - VICE|work=VICE|last=Lipez|first=Zachary|date=10 October 2017 |access-date=October 11, 2017}}</ref>

In 2018, surviving member Drew McDowall collaborated with British visual artist Florence To to perform an updated audio-visual version of the entire album in selected venues and festivals around the world.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Quo Vadis presents: Drew Mcdowall + Florence To [Time Machines / Live AV], Pod Blotz [Live] at Elsewhere, New York (2020) ⟋ RA |url=https://ra.co/events/1368008 |access-date=2022-11-06 |website=Resident Advisor |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=Drew McDowall (COIL) + Florence To: "Time Machines" {{!}} Conciertos y espectáculos {{!}} CaixaForum Barcelona |url=https://caixaforum.org/es/barcelona/p/drew-mcdowall-coil-florence-to-time-machines-_a8108513 |access-date=2022-11-06 |website=caixaforum.org |language=es-ES}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |date=2018-06-19 |title=Drew McDowall + Florence To "Time Machines Live AV 2018" |url=https://www.festivalforte.com/news-2018/drew-mcdowall-florence-to-time-machines-live-av-2018/ |access-date=2022-11-06 |website=FESTIVAL FORTE |language=en-US}}</ref>

==Reception==
{{Album ratings
|rev1 = [[AllMusic]]
|rev1score = {{Rating|4|5}}<ref name="Allmusic">{{cite web|url=https://www.allmusic.com/album/time-machines-mw0000033724|title=Time Machines – Coil|work=AllMusic|last=Cooper|first=Sean|access-date=March 31, 2018}}</ref>
}}<!-- Automatically generated by DASHBot-->
Sean Cooper of [[AllMusic]] gave the album four out of five stars and described it as "[e]njoyable, if a mite limited in scope."<ref name="Allmusic" /> Record distributor Boomkat praised the album upon its re-release, calling it a "now-classic chemical songbook".<ref name="boomkat">{{cite web|url=https://boomkat.com/products/time-machines|title=Coil - Time Machines - Boomkat|work=Boomkat|date=November 3, 2017}}</ref>

==Track listing==
{{tracklist
| collapsed       = 
| total_length    = 73:32
| title1          = 7-Methoxy-β-Carboline: (Telepathine)
| length1         = 23:23
| title2          = 2,5-Dimethoxy-4-Ethyl-Amphetamine: (DOET/Hecate)
| length2         = 13:20
| title3          = 5-Methoxy-N,N-Dimethyltryptamine: (5-MeO-DMT)
| length3         = 10:02
| title4          = 4-Indolol, 3-[2-(Dimethylamino)Ethyl], Phosphate Ester: (Psilocybin)
| length4         = 26:46
}}

== Personnel ==
According to [[AllMusic]]:<ref>{{Citation |title=Time Machines - Coil {{!}} Credits {{!}} AllMusic |url=https://www.allmusic.com/album/time-machines-mw0000033724/credits |language=en |access-date=2022-11-06}}</ref>

* [[Peter Christopherson]] – performer
* [[John Balance]] – performer
* [[Drew McDowall]] – performer

== References ==
{{Reflist}}

==External links==
* {{Discogs master|21769|Time Machines}}
* {{MusicBrainz release group|mbid=8c9b793b-4589-33cb-a325-c010f46ab2d4|name=Time Machines}}
* [http://brainwashed.com/common/htdocs/discog/eskaton10.php?site=coil08 ''Time Machines''] at [[Brainwashed (website)|Brainwashed]]
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20050206163239/http://brainwashed.com/coil/dot.html Time Machines website]
*stickers: [https://web.archive.org/web/20030118035111/http://brainwashed.com/coil/images/others/tm1.jpg 1], [https://web.archive.org/web/20030118035314/http://brainwashed.com/coil/images/others/tm2.jpg 2], [https://web.archive.org/web/20030118050820/http://brainwashed.com/coil/images/others/tm3.jpg 3], [https://web.archive.org/web/20020203052954/http://brainwashed.com/coil/images/others/tm4.jpg 4], [https://web.archive.org/web/20030118031334/http://brainwashed.com/coil/images/others/tm5.jpg 5], [https://web.archive.org/web/20030122135957/http://brainwashed.com/coil/images/others/tm6.jpg 6]
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20050206163239/http://brainwashed.com/coil/images/others/pin-persistence.jpg "Persistence Is All" badge]

==See also==
* [[Harmine]]
* [[2,5-Dimethoxy-4-ethylamphetamine|DOET/hecate]]
* [[5-MeO-DMT]]
* [[Psilocybin]]

{{Coil}}

{{Authority control}}

[[Category:1998 albums]]
[[Category:Coil (band) albums]]
[[Category:Drone music albums by English artists]]
[[Category:Psychedelic drug research]]