Reviewed by
iSvadrah

Read the ATR Review from the same venue.

Last Edit/Update
07 October, 1999

MINISTRY
the boys are back...?

Indianapolis, Indiana, USA. 7 August 1999

After ATR finished their opening set, it took the standard eternity for Ministry's gear [already onstage and at both sides] to be set up. We were shown glimpses of a dozen basses and guitars each, a mandolin, and even a banjo. When testing the synth/sampler, we heard the all-too familiar scream from "Just One Fix." Curious to see how Ministry would avoid sounding uber-slow after the crushing beats of Atari Teenage Riot, we were pained to find our answer came in the form of something akin to  Collective Soul playing over the sound system... the same four [if that many] songs, over and over again. After that, _anything_ would sound fast and intense.

Though I fast forward through many songs on the new album, Dark Side of the Spoon, I had promised myself many years ago that one day I would get to see the source for so much industrial and side project goodness. I had all of the back catalogue[s], and after seeing the "In Case You Didn't Feel Like Showing Up" video, I knew that it would be a memorable experience, sans Ogre, Chris Conelley, Bill Rieflin, etc etc etc.

The band walked casually onto the stage, and thought they looked much older, they didn't look "old and tired." Everyone was in black, Paul's hair was surprisingly light colored, and Al had his straw hat and big leather boots, as always. The glasses of Paul and Al had changed, Paul's looking more intellectual and Al's... well, they wrapped around in a spaceage sort of way. :) Al was a tad slow during the night, but nowhere near as blasted in some other performances, and the band only had to catch up with him once, so all in all it was a tight performance.

Forgive me in advance if I get the order of the songs off, but the guys behind us tackled the playlist. The first song of the night was "Reload," definitely what Ministry was doing after their last tour and album. 12 songs in the clip, and one in the chamber.

"Psalm 69" was next on the hitlist. Hypo Luxa and Hermes Pan cranked this anti-religious anthem out in true style, and the crowd went nuts. It is a song I always wanted to hear live [as was almost every other song of the night!]. I noticed that Paul and Al especially had fun lip-synching to all of the samples during the night. Seeing as how they have been playing these songs hundreds of times for years, it was good to see they still _enjoyed_ them.

Then Buck Satan and co. shot us with "Crumbs," a track I really enjoyed. It sounded every bit as good as the album vers., and the drummer's work really helped nail down the rough groove the song has. Mr. Jourgensen played around with his vocal delivery during the night, singing some notes high when they usually drop down low or vice versa, but it all sounded fresh and improved, not clumsy.

"Filth Pig" from the often-maligned album of the same name was next, and I find myself appreciating it more when I hear it these days. The audience really didn't know how to properly "rock out" during this one [neither did I *g*], and so the pit was relatively calm for once during the Ministry set... but perhaps only once.

"Lava" was one track that I would have never guessed Ministry to play live, and I knew why: even thought the live version was indeed awesome, and thick and bubbling as the album track, it did however lack in low end. It is said the original was done all with guitar, pitch shifted down [seeing as Al had a little while back given oddly generous plugs for the Boss Harmonizer pedal], and onstage, everything just didn't have enough bass. Not surprisingly, most of the crowd was only able to sing the chorus. The sax player followed the chorus line, which sounded great. Al did some notable harmonica stuff, and then some weird-bordering-on-just-plain- bad tinkering [*honk*... pause...*hooonk*...] as the night went on.

They actually put out another mic for the intercom vox on "Bad Blood," and Al did a great job slouching from one to the other as the song progressed. The sax player drew good-natured laughs from the crowd, as he played as aggressively as I guess you can on a sax during Lava, Bad Blood, and a few of the Psalm 69 tracks, getting some truly horridly wonderful non-sax sounds in the process. The songs he didn't play during, he stood at the side of the stage and kind of bobbed up and down enthusiastically.

"Thieves" was a welcome oldie, to which the crowd thrashed about rabidly. They all screamed the lyrics, samples, and even the triggered shouts in time with the music. The TMIATTTT tracks sounded surprisingly fresh and full of life, considering how old the disc is.

Some odd percussive loops eminated from the stage, and as the bass and drums kicked in, everyone realized that they were getting to hear "So What" live. I think the crowd was at its most violent during this culture-smashing anthem, and for a good reason. The live version hadn't lost a bit of the original's sinister quality. Al and co. grinned as they mouthed out the smorgasbord of samples, and Al made arm motions to the drummer during most 'assassin...assassin...' parts as if to cue him...

"N.W.O." was late in the set for an album-opening track, and I think it lost some of its power because of it. Another factor could have been that the crowd was getting exhausted during the back-to-back hits, though they did manage to get enough strength to throw people around. The amount of crowd surfers [and ones dropped to the ground [*g*] increased as the night went on.

"Just One Fix" and "Hero" also got played, though the latter was really hard to make out. I was either deaf by then, or the mix was just plain muddy and sufficiently different from the album version. JOF featured Al grinning maniacally during 'never trust a junkie,' and everyone onstage seemed remarkably laid back as they hammered out the fast beats and even faster riffs. Paul gets a bonus score for his patient endurance, plunking out the solid bass lines during every track in that Ministry fashion...
Toward the end, or perhaps all the way through, AL didn't actually sing the chorus, only the 'one fix...' part. The crowd did the rest.

Then the band left the stage and laid in wait. After an appropriate length of waiting, during which laughing fans [apparently _very_ pleased with the show] requested everything from "Supermaniac Soul" to "Work for Love" and "Cold Life," Ministry came back, and launched into their self-admitted "nonsense rock song," "Jesus Built My Hotrod." Al took the helm on vox, and seemed to get all the words [!?] right. A superb live version.

The final song of the night was, to everyone's surprise... "Supernaut!" They actually hauled out the late and great 1000 Homo DJs hit Black Sabbath cover to cap off the night, and it sounded wonderful. The only DSOTS track ended up being "Bad Blood," much to everyone's surprise and pleasure, rather unexpected behavior for a band pushing a new album. ;)

The mandatory towels, water bottles, and playlists were then thrown to the crowd, and the men in black sauntered off the stage, no worse for wear than when the show began. It can definitely be said that they're aging well!

My advice to anyone not interested in seeing Ministry anymore: _go_. They will not let you down, or wander around on stage with weaker material, the fear of many an old Ministry fan. It was even worth the TicketBastard charge.

MINISTRY playlist:
reload
psalm 69
filth pig
crumbs
lava
bad blood
thieves
so what
n.w.o.
just one fix
hero

ENCORE:
jesus built my hotrod
supernaut

With sympathy: William Tucker

PS- I also recently picked up the Ministry tribute disc on Invisible Records, "Wish you were queer." I wasn't really thrilled with the output, especially how much this comp [or the very idea of it] has bounced around from label to label. Meg Lee Chin's rendition of "Scarecrow" was good despite the new-Pigface- sound feel it had. Pig's version of "Just Like You," stood out above most, but was still rather long and unusually mellow for Watts. Julian Beeston's "Angel [shining mix]" was clever, especially with the RevCo "Beers Steers and Queers" loops mixed in, [most notably during the last minute and a half]. Both Here and Eco-Hed's tracks had great grooves...until the vocals in each came in. Most painfully, despite being an avid DeathRide 69, the rendition of "Burning Inside [drain fetish mix]" relied on a shameful amount of MC-303 Groovebox samples and sequences, something that made me wince.  I was disappointed both with how much _old_ material was covered, as well as the lack of tracks from previous incarnations of the comp, such as En Esch's cheeky version of "Work for Love." Pick it up only if you must, I suppose.