Monday, June 23, 2014

Ministry - What a Wonderful World

One of my favorite songs, rendered by one of my favorite bands. And yet, such an unlikely combination!
(If you prefer your industrial thrash faster, go to the latter half. But I think the slower version is, well, wonderful. Actually the faster one too.)




I am reading Al Jourgensen's Autobio, and all I can say so far is that if you think it's a miracle Iggy Pop is still alive... !!! The amount of alcohol, crack, and heroin the man has consumed is phenomenal, he must be a demi-god to still walk upright and be coherent.

By the way, here is one of those cases where the live version beats the studio version. The long intro is fantastic, with the two drummers. (It should optimally be played loud to be appreciated, much of Ministry's music has a distinct Wall Of Sound quality.)


(Woa, this is an hour. Enough for anybody but real fans, I fear!    :-)

I never liked the brain-dead aggression of Ministry concerts. I feel it does not have anything to do with the brilliance of the music. And to my relief, Al feels some of the same, he hates touring, and he dislikes the violent audience, most of who are clearly there because they like something else in his music than he does himself.
He even claims that his hatred of touring is the reason for his abuse, but I think that issue is probably more complex than so.

4 comments:

TC [Girl] said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Eolake Stobblehouse said...

Yes, I agree, because I think his music is world-class brilliant, and it's broadly acknowledged that it has had enormous influence and perhaps created a whole genre, mixing electronica and hard rock and sampling, which was not really done before he did it in the eighties.
And it's clear that most of the audience don't really see the difference between that and garden-variety hard rock.

On the other hand, with his behavior he should not really be surprised. He is probably really intelligent, but he acts often like a buffoon, being beligerent and dismissive, lying just for the fun of it...

TC [Girl] said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Eolake Stobblehouse said...

I just think he has looooots of issues. Like most of us.

It is common now, but before 20 years ago, almost nobody used rock guitars and digital instruments and samplings in the same band.