Chris and Cosey
Encyclopedia
Chris & Cosey, now performing as Carter Tutti, are a band formed in 1981, consisting of partners Chris Carter
and Cosey Fanni Tutti
, both previously members of industrial music
pioneers Throbbing Gristle
.
and began recording as Chris & Cosey. They recorded four albums for the label using electronics, sampling, Cosey's vocals and cornet
playing. In 1983, they formed their own independent record label
Creative Technology Institute (aka CTI) to release more experimental works and collaborations. The first CTI projects, Elemental 7 and European Rendezvous, were released through Cabaret Voltaire
's DoubleVision label.
In the late 1980s and early 1990s, the duo worked with a number of independent labels such as Nettwerk
(Canada), Play It Again Sam
(Belgium), Staalplaat
(Netherlands), and Wax Trax!
(USA), and World Serpent Distribution
(UK). In 1992, for artistic and health reasons, the duo stopped touring and concentrated on studio work. They returned to performing live in 1998, documented on the Union album.
They have collaborated with such artists as Monte Cazazza
, Coil
, Current 93
, John Duncan, Erasure
, Eurythmics
, Boyd Rice
, and Robert Wyatt
. Their 1988 Core album is a collection of such collaborations.
Recently, Carter and Tutti have released two ongoing CD series of instrumental music: The Library Of Sound (L.O.S.) and Electronic Ambient Remixes (E.A.R.), currently with four volumes each. The E.A.R. series are remixes of material released solo by Carter or Tutti.
album Black Ships Ate the Sky
.
Carter and Tutti have also become involved again with Throbbing Gristle, which reformed with all four original members for a December 2004 All Tomorrow's Parties
festival appearance, and recorded new studio albums TG Now
(2004) and Part Two (2007). They also did a short series of concerts in Europe and the United States in 2009, with an ostensibly tour-only release (the few remaining copies were sold via mail-order only) called The Third Mind Movements
.
Live albums:
as CTI:
Compilations:
as Conspiracy International:
Chris Carter (musician)
Chris Carter was born on January 28, 1953 in London, England and educated at the Friern Barnet Grammar School. He is best known for being a synthesist and member of Throbbing Gristle and Chris & Cosey...
and Cosey Fanni Tutti
Cosey Fanni Tutti
Cosey Fanni Tutti is best known as a performance artist and for her time in Throbbing Gristle and Chris & Cosey....
, both previously members of industrial music
Industrial music
Industrial music is a style of experimental music that draws on transgressive and provocative themes. The term was coined in the mid-1970s with the founding of Industrial Records by the band Throbbing Gristle, and the creation of the slogan "industrial music for industrial people". In general, the...
pioneers Throbbing Gristle
Throbbing Gristle
Throbbing Gristle were an English industrial, avant-garde music and visual arts group that evolved from the performance art group COUM Transmissions...
.
History
When Throbbing Gristle broke up in 1981, Carter and Tutti signed with Rough Trade RecordsRough Trade Records
Rough Trade Records is an independent record label based in London. It was formed in 1978 by Geoff Travis who had opened a record store off Ladbroke Grove...
and began recording as Chris & Cosey. They recorded four albums for the label using electronics, sampling, Cosey's vocals and cornet
Cornet
The cornet is a brass instrument very similar to the trumpet, distinguished by its conical bore, compact shape, and mellower tone quality. The most common cornet is a transposing instrument in B. It is not related to the renaissance and early baroque cornett or cornetto.-History:The cornet was...
playing. In 1983, they formed their own independent record label
Independent record label
An independent record label is a record label operating without the funding of or outside the organizations of the major record labels. A great number of bands and musical acts begin on independent labels.-Overview:...
Creative Technology Institute (aka CTI) to release more experimental works and collaborations. The first CTI projects, Elemental 7 and European Rendezvous, were released through Cabaret Voltaire
Cabaret Voltaire (band)
Cabaret Voltaire were a British music group from Sheffield, England.Initially composed of Stephen Mallinder, Richard H. Kirk and Chris Watson, the group was named after the Cabaret Voltaire, a nightclub in Zürich, Switzerland that was a centre for the early Dada movement.Their earliest performances...
's DoubleVision label.
In the late 1980s and early 1990s, the duo worked with a number of independent labels such as Nettwerk
Nettwerk
The Nettwerk Music Group is the umbrella company for Nettwerk Management, Nettwerk Records, Nettwerk One Publishing, Nutone Records, and Artwerk. With over 150 employees, the Vancouver-based company has offices in New York, Los Angeles, London, Boston, Nashville, and Hamburg...
(Canada), Play It Again Sam
Play It Again Sam (record label)
[PIAS] Recordings is the recorded music division of the [PIAS] Entertainment Group, a European independent artist and label services company.The record labels that operate under the [PIAS] Recordings umbrella are: Play It Again Sam, Wall of Sound and Different Recordings.Aside from the three London...
(Belgium), Staalplaat
Staalplaat
Staalplaat is an independent record label that is located in Amsterdam with a separate store in Berlin. Created in 1982, the company's mission was created as a sound forum for sound artists, who write and perform new and experimental music...
(Netherlands), and Wax Trax!
Wax Trax! Records
Wax Trax! Records was an independent record label in the United States. Wax Trax! began as a record shop in Denver, Colorado opened by Jim Nash and Dannie Flesher. They sold the store in 1978 and, in November of that year, opened a new one under the same name at 2449 North Lincoln Avenue in...
(USA), and World Serpent Distribution
World Serpent Distribution
World Serpent Distribution was a British record label and music distribution house formed in the 1990s by David Gibson, Alan Trench and Alison Webster...
(UK). In 1992, for artistic and health reasons, the duo stopped touring and concentrated on studio work. They returned to performing live in 1998, documented on the Union album.
They have collaborated with such artists as Monte Cazazza
Monte Cazazza
Monte Cazazza is an American artist and composer best known for his seminal role in helping shape the early landscape of industrial music through recordings with the London-based Industrial Records in the mid-1970s.-Career:...
, Coil
Coil (band)
Coil were an English cross-genre, experimental music group formed in 1982 by John Balance—later credited as "Jhonn Balance"—and his partner Peter Christopherson, aka "Sleazy". The duo worked together on a series of releases before Balance chose the name Coil, which he claimed to be...
, Current 93
Current 93
Current 93 is an eclectic British experimental music group, working since the early 1980s in folk-based musical forms. The band was founded in 1982 by David Tibet .-Background:Tibet has been the only constant in the group, though Steven Stapleton has appeared on...
, John Duncan, Erasure
Erasure
Erasure are an English synthpop duo, consisting of songwriter and keyboardist Vince Clarke and singer Andy Bell. Erasure entered the music scene in 1985 with their debut single "Who Needs Love Like That"...
, Eurythmics
Eurythmics
Eurythmics were a British pop rock duo, formed in 1980, currently disbanded, but known to reunite from time to time. Consisting of members Annie Lennox and David A...
, Boyd Rice
Boyd Rice
Boyd Blake Rice is an American experimental sound/noise musician using the name of NON since the mid-1970s, archivist, actor, photographer, author, member of the Partridge Family Temple religious group, co-founder of the UNPOP art movement and current staff writer for Modern Drunkard...
, and Robert Wyatt
Robert Wyatt
Robert Wyatt is an English musician, and founding member of the influential Canterbury scene band Soft Machine, with a long and distinguished solo career...
. Their 1988 Core album is a collection of such collaborations.
Recently, Carter and Tutti have released two ongoing CD series of instrumental music: The Library Of Sound (L.O.S.) and Electronic Ambient Remixes (E.A.R.), currently with four volumes each. The E.A.R. series are remixes of material released solo by Carter or Tutti.
2000-present
To greet the 21st century, Chris & Cosey became Carter Tutti, celebrating the rebirth with a series of concerts which were documented on the live album LEM Festival October 2003. The rebirth was completed by the release of the studio album Cabal later that year. Both also appeared as guests on the 2006 Current 93Current 93
Current 93 is an eclectic British experimental music group, working since the early 1980s in folk-based musical forms. The band was founded in 1982 by David Tibet .-Background:Tibet has been the only constant in the group, though Steven Stapleton has appeared on...
album Black Ships Ate the Sky
Black Ships Ate the Sky
Black Ships Ate the Sky is a 2006 album by Current 93. The album features numerous guest vocalists, such as Antony Hegarty, Bonnie 'Prince' Billy, Marc Almond, and Shirley Collins. It features nine versions of the 1763 Methodist hymn "Idumæa", with lyrics by Charles Wesley, each featuring vocals by...
.
Carter and Tutti have also become involved again with Throbbing Gristle, which reformed with all four original members for a December 2004 All Tomorrow's Parties
All Tomorrow's Parties (music festival)
All Tomorrow's Parties is a music festival which takes place at Camber Sands holiday camp in East Sussex and Butlin's holiday camp in Minehead, Somerset, England....
festival appearance, and recorded new studio albums TG Now
TG Now
TG Now is an album by industrial group Throbbing Gristle. The 12" vinyl was limited to 500 copies and the CD version was limited to 3,000 copies.-CD:#"X-Ray" - 8:36#"Splitting Sky" - 12:08#"Almost Like This" - 10:47#"How Do You Deal" - 13:57...
(2004) and Part Two (2007). They also did a short series of concerts in Europe and the United States in 2009, with an ostensibly tour-only release (the few remaining copies were sold via mail-order only) called The Third Mind Movements
The Third Mind Movements
The Third Mind Movements is an album released by British industrial group Throbbing Gristle in April 2009 from recordings made at the 2007 Desertshore Installation at the Institute of Contemporary Art on 1 to 3 June 2007. All of the original line-up were present...
.
Albums
- Heartbeat (1981), Rough Trade
- Trance (1982), Rough Trade
- Songs of Love & Lust (1984), Rough Trade
- Techno Primitiv (1985), Rough Trade
- Allotropy (1987), Staalplaat
- Sweet Surprise (1987), Dragon
- Exotika (1987), Play It Again Sam
- Trust (1989), Play It Again Sam
- Pagan Tango (1991), Play It Again Sam/WaxTrax!
- Musik Fantastique (1992), Play It Again Sam
- Twist (1995), T&B Vinyl
- Skimble Skamble (1997), World Serpent
- Cabal (2004), CTI - Carter Tutti
- Feral Vapours of the Silver Ether (2007), CTI - as Carter Tutti
Live albums:
- Action! (1987), LD
- Union (1999), World Serpent
- C&C Luchtbal (2003) CTI, live album
- LEM Festival October 2003 (2004) GliptotekaMagdalae, live album as Carter Tutti
as CTI:
- Elemental 7 (1984), DoubleVision
- European Rendezvous - CTI Live 1983 (1984), DoubleVision
- Core (1988), Nettwerk/Play It Again Sam
- Metaphysical - "The library of sound" Edition One (1993), World Serpent
- Chronomanic - "The library of sound" Edition Two (1994), World Serpent
- In Continuum - "The library of sound" Edition Three (1995), World Serpent
- Point Seven - "The library of sound" Edition Four (1998), World Serpent
Compilations:
- Collectiv One: Conspiracy International (1989), Play It Again Sam
- Collectiv Two: The Best of Chris and Cosey (1989), Play It Again Sam
- Collectiv Three: An Elemental Rendevous [sic] (1990), Play It Again Sam
- Collectiv Four: Archive Recordings (1990), Play It Again Sam
- Reflection (1990), WaxTrax!
- The Essential Chris & Cosey Collection (2002), World Serpent
- Collected Works 1981 - 2000 (2006), Conspiracy International
Singles
- "Night Shift" (1982) - flexi-disc with Vinyl magazine, split with Minimal CompactMinimal CompactMinimal Compact were an Israeli rock band associated with the post punk and indie rock movement of the 1980s.-Biography:Between its foundation in 1981 and its dissolution seven years later, Minimal Compact played a small role in the European rock scene...
- "This is Me" (1983), Music Time - split with Wahnfried-Brown
- "October (Love Song)" (1983), Rough Trade
- "Sweet Surprise" (1985), Rough Trade
- "Obsession" (1987), Play It Again Sam
- "Obsession (remix)" (1987), Nettwerk
- "Exotika" (1988), Play It Again Sam
- "Exotika (extended remix)" (1988), Nettwerk
- "Rise" (1988), Play It Again Sam
- "Synaesthesia" (1991), Play It Again Sam
- "Passion" (1991), World Serpent
as Conspiracy International:
- "Hammer House" (1984), CTI
- "Thy Gift of Tongues" (1985), CTI
See also
- Throbbing GristleThrobbing GristleThrobbing Gristle were an English industrial, avant-garde music and visual arts group that evolved from the performance art group COUM Transmissions...
- Chris CarterChris Carter (musician)Chris Carter was born on January 28, 1953 in London, England and educated at the Friern Barnet Grammar School. He is best known for being a synthesist and member of Throbbing Gristle and Chris & Cosey...
- Cosey Fanni TuttiCosey Fanni TuttiCosey Fanni Tutti is best known as a performance artist and for her time in Throbbing Gristle and Chris & Cosey....