Current 93

Current 93 are an English experimental music group, working since the early 1980s in folk-based musical forms. The band was founded in 1982 by David Tibet, who has been Current 93's only constant member.

Background
Current 93 initially consisted of Tibet, fellow Psychic TV alumnus Jhonn Balance, and 23 Skidoo member Fritz Catlin. Tibet has been the only constant member in the group, though Steven Stapleton (of Nurse with Wound) has appeared on nearly every Current 93 release. Michael Cashmore has also been a constant contributor since Thunder Perfect Mind. Douglas P. of Death in June has played on well over a dozen Current 93 releases, and Steve Ignorant of Crass (using the name Stephen Intelligent), Boyd Rice, runologist Freya Aswynn, Ian Read, Nick Cave, Björk, Andrew W.K., Anohni, Baby Dee, Will Oldham, Ben Chasny, Rose McDowall, have also lent their talents over the years.

Current 93 have released over twenty albums and many singles as well.

Much of Current 93's early work was similar to late 1970s and early 1980s industrial music: abrasive tape loops, droning synthesizer noises and Tibet's distorted, excoriating vocals.

Tibet's lyrics have been fairly consistent, regardless of delivery: The earlier recordings reflect his preoccupation with death, Christ, mysticism, Aleister Crowley (Tibet borrowed the term "93 Current" from Crowley – the 93 Current being the current of Thelema or Agape), Tibetan Buddhism, Gnosticism, runes, swastikas, Noddy, The Wicker Man, and a variety of occult notions. The later to present-day period of Current 93's recordings increasingly reflect Tibet's interest in Christian mysticism and apocalypse. Tibet has stated that he identifies as a Christian.

Literary influences include Lautreamont's Les Chants de Maldoror, the Bible, The Poetic Eddas, the Child Ballads, Hildegard von Bingen, Yukio Mishima, John Dee's De Heptarchia Mystica, The Thunder, Perfect Mind, William Blake, Louis Wain, writer Thomas Ligotti, occult British author Arthur Machen (originator of the title "The Inmost Light"), M.R. James's various ghost stories, The Cloud of Unknowing, Count Eric Stenbock, and Russell Hoban's Riddley Walker.

Primary, full-length, Current 93 studio albums
• Nature Unveiled (1984)

• Dogs Blood Rising (1984)

• Live at Bar Maldoror (1985)

• In Menstrual Night (1986)

• Dawn (1987)

• Imperium (1987)

• Christ and the Pale Queens Mighty in Sorrow (1988)

• Swastikas for Noddy (1988)

• Earth Covers Earth (1988)

• Crooked Crosses for the Nodding God (1989)

• Looney Runes (1990)

• Thunder Perfect Mind (1992)

• Of Ruine or Some Blazing Starre (1994)

• All the Pretty Little Horses: The Inmost Light (1996)

• Soft Black Stars (1998)

• Sleep Has His House (2000)

• Faust (2000)

• The Great in the Small (2001)

• How He Loved the Moon (Moonsongs for Jhonn Balance) (2005)

• Hypnagogue/Hypnagogue II (2005)

• Black Ships Ate the Sky (2006)

• Aleph at Hallucinatory Mountain (2009)

• Baalstorm, Sing Omega (2010)

• HoneySuckle Æons (2011)

• I Am the Last of All the Field That Fell: A Channel (2014)

• The Light Is Leaving Us All (2018)

• If a City Is Set Upon a Hill (2022)

Compilation appearances

 * "Black Ships Ate the Sky (Alternate Mix)" on Brainwaves (2006)

Current 93 Presents releases

 * 1986 Aleister Crowley – The Hastings Archives/The World As Power LP
 * 1988 The Venerable 'Chi.med Rig. 'dzin Lama, Rinpoche – Tantric rNying.ma Chant of Tibet LP/CD
 * 1990 Harry Oldfield – Crystal LP/CD
 * 1990 Sveinbjorn Beinteinsson – Edda LP/CD
 * 1992 Shirley Collins – Fountain of Snow CD
 * 1995 Tiny Tim – Songs of an Impotent Troubadour CD
 * 1997 The Aryan Aquarians – Meet Their Waterloo LP/CD

Sheet music
Music sheets for piano and voice were released in 2017 by Terentyev Music Publishing Company, containing the album Soft Black Stars. The digital version is the complete music transcription of the album. The printed version contains piano notation and the lyrics (but not the vocal lines) and provides a complete overview of which melodies and harmonies each song from Soft Black Stars should be improvised around, "to make your own stars" as David Tibet writes. The press-release says "It was, indeed, in this way that the Soft Black Stars were created during the recording sessions and in concerts."