There is no firm evidence for glaciation for over 1.5 billion years, i.e. from the Great Oxidation Event (or Episode) until the onset of the Cryogenian Period. By contrast, global glaciation became the predominant climate state for the next 85 million years, followed by a series of regional ice ages that culminated in the Ediacaran-Cambrian biological radiations. There is increasing evidence that each of these climatic events was preceded by a negative carbon isotope anomaly, potentially caused by imbalance within the global sulphur cycle and related redox and productivity feedbacks. In this presentation, I aim to outline the evidence for primary carbon isotope anomalies before transitions into glaciation at c. 720 Ma, c. 660 Ma, c. 580 Ma and c. 560 Ma, as well as similar isotopic events that have identical geochemical context, but for which no glacial deposits have yet been identified. Cryogenian-to-Cambrian carbon cycle elasticity reflects a distinct earth system state, which was likely related to a dynamically changing organic carbon reservoir, oxidation of which was coupled to sulphate and ferric iron reduction. Organic carbon likely became the dominant redox (and climate) capacitor in the exogenic earth system only once atmospheric oxygen ceased to be a limiting factor for the weathering of iron sulphide minerals. The extent to which sulphur cycle imbalance forced climatic and environmental change after the Cambrian explosion remains to be determined.