'Malicious Intent'
- Ministry at the Astoria 2/07/2003
As the legend would have it, Ministry are apparently crap live. The band are allegedly a complete shambles on stage; There's supposedly far too many of them and the performance just gets lost in a sea of guitarists. The electronic parts are usually completely out of sync and whilst Al Jourgensen may be able to rival Jim Thirwell in the studio, but he's a useless live frontman.
Whatever your opinion of Ministry, you've got to feel a bit sorry for Al Jourgensen these days. Trent Reznor gets the critical acclaim, Fear Factory have the massive fanbase, Rammstein get all the scandalous headlines, and Marilyn Manson has the sales, yet Ministry and all of Al Jourgensen and Paul Barker's other offshoot projects sit on the shelf, unloved and unwanted, despite starting the whole industrial metal thing in the first place (And let us not forget how wonderful their early industrio-dance releases such as 'Twitch' were, even if Jourgensen would rather forget about his 80s synth-pop past now!). Maybe the memories of their two plodding mid-nineties releases 'Filth Pig' and 'Dark Side of the Spoon' are still all too recent, but the industrio-metal masses should really give the band another try. New LP 'Animositisomina' is probably their best since Psalm 69.
Still the rumour mill would have it that the times they are a changing. Ministry's last gig in March had a pretty good response, with word being that the band have replaced a lot of their key live personnel with far better musicians and that their set focuses for the most part on more recent material. Considering how rare their visits to the shores have been (they didn't play properly here until 1992, and since then their performances have been pretty thread bare) the fact that this is their third appearance in the UK in less than 6 months is a pretty good sign.
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The lack of a support band for tonight is a bit of a downer, and makes the wait for the band seem all the longer. Eventually the back screen film of a writhing dancer appears underneath the Ministry logo, and it's not long before Al and his merry men are onstage. |
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With Al's skeletal mike stand and the two drummers in place we can see that Ministry aren't giving us anything by halves tonight. I counted a total of seven bodies onstage, I'm sure there's actually less members of Tapeworm!
We open with 'Animosity' from their new LP, in which Al takes back from the boy Reznor what Trent stole by the numbers in 1994. The sound mix is perhaps the best I've ever heard at the Astoria, with none of the elements of the band hogging the mix at the expense of any of the others. Even the electronic sections are completely audible. Al at first grips at the bony handles on his mike stand like he's revving up the fattest Harley in town. Soon he's gesturing hands aloft like a preacher in a satanic pulpit. He's not straddling his guitar, so it makes him easy to pick out amongst the small army of guitar players onstage. He's still no great showman as regards onstage quips, but the power of the music coming from his band does most of the talking. A host of tracks from the new LP follow, most following in the Godflesh-meets-Testament path of the first track.
Not surprisingly, Psalm 69 tracks fill out most of the set. There's a fresh new version of 'NWO' with some ace samples and fleeting glances of George W B on the video screen. When the crowd joins in a mocking chant of 'God bless America' with a bit too much sincerity, Al shakes his head with disapproval.
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'Just One Fix' is of course the track that Rammstein have built a whole career out of, and believe me the view screen images for this one really are sick (literally). I pity anyone who was watching this after doing exactly what the lyrics suggest! |
No sign of 'Jesus Built My Hotrod' though. I know that Al didn't sing the vinyl version (That honour went to Gilby Haynes of the Butthole Surfers) but they did play the track at their last Astoria show, so I lived in hope.
There's not a lot from 'Filth Pig' (save for the title track) and from 'Dark Side' we only get 'Supermatic Soul'. 'Bad Blood' also crops up, although I guess that's more famous for being on the Matrix soundtrack. At least when Al finally straps on a guitar for these songs, he isn't so static in his performance as he has been in the past, and actually moves about amongst the various microphones along the front of the stage.
The frenetic 'Stigmata' closes the lead set, with such powerful guitars it's hard to believe that the studio version was for the most part electronics and samples. They're back for more new album japery soon, followed by 'Breathe' from 'The Mind is a Terrible Thing to Taste'. This of course still has Al's best lyric ("Breathe Fucker, Breathe!" repeated constantly for five minutes!) and Paul Barker strips off his jacket to show off his bare scrawny frame (perhaps the best warning against the perils of drug abuse that you'll ever see!) . Their cover of Black Sabbath's 'Supernaut' (recorded as 1000 Homo DJs) closes proceedings. Al supplies the vocals for this one, despite their original version having the pleading tones of one Trent Reznor behind the mike, which again gives a greater arguement for a live version of 'Jesus Built My Hotrod' sung by Al.
So it looks like the legends have been finally blown away, Jourgensen and Co really can dominate a stage after all, guess it pays not to listen to heresy, eh?
