Justify Your Shitty Taste: Ministry’s “Filth Pig”

By: andrew Posted in: featured, justify your shitty taste On: Wednesday, January 19th, 2011

ministry filthpig glossy

Almost every band has that album: you know, the critically and/or commercially reviled dud in an otherwise passable-to-radical back catalog. Well, every Wednesday morning, a Decibel staffer or special guest will take to the Deciblog to bitch and moan at length as to why everybody’s full of shit and said dud is, in fact, The Shit. Today’s submission: managing editor Andrew Bonazelli squeals for Ministry’s Filth Pig.

“It certainly wasn’t Psalm 70” —Al Jourgensen, Decibel #037

It took three and a half years for Ministry to release the follow-up to Psalm 69, and most of the new mainstream fans the (more or less) duo made via Lollapalooza ’92 and 120 Minutes’ late-night rotation of “Just One Fix” and “N.W.O.” probably wondered if it was laid down in three and a half hours. And that’s one of a zillion things I love about this record. (Okay, one of, like, four things.) Al Jourgensen and Paul Barker could have opened wide and followed Gravity Kills, Stabbing Westward, Filter and God Lives Underwater into the radio-ready alt-industrial “big time.” Hell, all were clumsily operating from the template set down in late ’80s masterpieces The Land of Rape and Honey and The Mind Is a Terrible Thing to Taste anyway. Instead, Ministry assembled an aggressively unlikeable 10-track face-fuck, and threw a guy wearing a meat helmet on the cover.
filth cover
Mr. Meat Helmet dispassionately clutching his tiny American flag maintains Jourgensen’s longstanding commitment to really really blunt political commentary, which got pretty tired by interchangeable career-closing anti-Dubya trilogy Houses of the Molé, Rio Grande Blood and The Last Sucker. Other than that iconic (in my world) image, though, what little is discernible of the lyrics appears apolitical—an unfocused, slovenly fury that I generally quite prefer to hardcore lefty rhetoric. (I can get that from Facebook, thanks.) Al admitted to our own Andrew Parks that he did “a lot of it on my own—shooting heroin and playing my guitar.” This record sounds, uh, a lot like that.

Anybody who followed Ministry’s long, satisfying evolution from pre-fab dipshittery (Twitch) to holy-fuck electro-executioners (The Land of Rape and Honey) to straight-up industrial metal standard-bearers (Psalm 69) knew what to expect: breakneck BPMs, off-putting danceability, distorted riffage, disorienting samples. “Shooting heroin and playing guitar” took us just a bit by surprise. Although Filth Pig does ignite with the ear-raping “Reload,” in which co-producers Jourgensen and Barker managed to distill the sound of your kid sister whining for the entirety of a three-hour car trip into one two-and-a-half minute guitar track. But at least it’s a fair jumping-off-point from Psalm 69.

Then sludge. And I don’t mean Eyehategod sludge. Just toxic fucking spew. Six minutes worth of it on the title track, with about as fuckin’-a-right of a two-chord refrain as you can get. Unlike “Reload,” “Filth Pig”’s riff doesn’t sound like shitting broken glass—more like Quicksand or Faith No More. Moving on, if you like the mid-paced grind of “Lava,” good, ’cause that’s all you’ll be hearing for the next six and a half minutes (aside from a wildly obnoxious “Piiiiiiiiiigggggggyyyyyyyyy” sample that’s either the unfortunate influence of Gibby Haynes or Trent Reznor. Or heroin.)

By this point in 1996, most listeners either traded this thing for October Rust (good call) or just used it for lines/coffee, but it gets worse/awesomer. The isolated chug intro to “Crumbs” makes you think things are gonna get good—or at least familiar—but get ready to never hear it again, as another mid-tempo slog pounds along beneath a succession of Guantanamo-friendly cymbal crashes. The suicide march is broken up by one of Al’s few discernible, trademark burns (“You’ll eat a plate of shit covered in refried crumbs”), which is a big plus. Subtle modulations here and later on—in lieu of conventional choruses—reward repeated listens. If you’re a masochist. Which, in this case, I clearly am.
ministry al
“Dead Guy” is as close as Filth Pig gets to accessibility, and after appropriately-titled formless rave-up “Useless,” a welcome break: isolated riff, ugly harmonic, tension-building doubling of isolated riff, and when the drums kick in to unveil a killer Meantime groove, a third guitar squalls menacingly to substantially darken atmosphere. If you can’t bear to listen to this fucker in sequence, or simply must cherry-pick shit that sounds like the Ministry you know and love, this and “Filth Pig” are where to start.

The rest of the originals are a blur of volatile unstructured soundscapes, from “The Fall” to “Brick Windows” and “Game Show,” the latter two unfortunately epitomizing Al’s “Let’s write endless, boring songs” approach before the aforementioned back-to-basics Dubya trilogy. As for the polarizing cover of Dylan’s “Lay Lady Lay,” which Jourgensen did on his own just to piss off Barker, all I can say is the same way that Harvey Danger or Sublime makes me wish Saddam had intercontinental nuclear capabilities in the ’90s, this is the total and wonderful opposite.

What a strange, uncompromising album. The one time I saw them tour off it, they were fucking god-awful. Go get it for like 50 cents on Amazon. Probably less.

Tracklisting:
1. “Reload”
2. “Filth Pig”
3. “Lava”
4. “Crumbs”
5. “Useless”
6. “Dead Guy”
7. “Game Show”
8. “The Fall”
9. “Lay, Lady, Lay”
10. “Brick Windows”it

  • http://twitter.com/#!/shawnmacomber Shawn Macomber

    Great bit! Those with an affinity for the noise tracks on Psalm and Mind definitely get their money’s worth on this one. As for everyone else…I attended Lollapalooza 92 where during Pearl Jam’s set–playing second or third, as I recall, OPENING for Ministry pre-”Jeremy”–Eddie Vedder said he wanted to return to the stage and burn a flag during Ministry’s set. This didn’t happen, of course, although much of the Great Woods fence WAS torn down for pyre fire, a perfect setting for that Ministry era. Anyway, I’m pretty sure Pearl Jam never sought the same solidarity when the Filth Pig tour hit Seattle a few years later. The band really did prove they could give a fuck about exploiting the big time accolades or endorsements, though in later years, scurrying back to the dissipated old sound, you got the sense maybe Al wished they had. Thanks for this Andrew!

  • Scott Rule

    Awesome album. Still waiting on “The Mind Is A Terrible Thing To Taste” Hall Of Fame piece… That would be killer.

  • Jakob

    I did an Interview with Blake from Nachtmystium and when i asked him his top 5 albums of all time this was the first one he mentioned.

  • Rev. Joel

    This is my favorite Ministry album, hands down.

  • Shane

    *A stadium full of people standing and applauding*

  • phatchief666

    I won this on John Kavanagh’s Radio 1 Rock Show in the UK. This is my absolute favourite Ministry album. ‘The Fall’ is an absolute spine tinglingly awesome track. The whole album is just an absolute ‘fuck you’ to their newly found fame after Psalm 69. You can imagine Big Al’ slumped in a gas station cubicle covered in vomit with a half empty bottle of jack with all of the lyrics to this album written in blood on the walls… Yep. Thats what I think when I listen to this album.

  • post-felix

    I dug this out after reading that piece with Blake from Nachtmystium, and hot damn, it does have its merits that I didn’t appreciate 15 years ago….holy shit, this was 15 years ago?!

  • Brian

    Unlike everyone I knew at the time, I really loved this album. Still do. It pales in comparison to all of their previous work, but Psalm 69 was so amazing, the chances of them topping it really were pretty slim. Especially being as smacked out as they were.

  • Joseph Schafer88

    This was my first Ministry album, and Reload was one of the first riffs I ever tried to learn–I still crank the track, and it has Ministry’s best video (love Al as Jackie K).

    In a weird way I think this is Ministry’s “Kid A.” Except Radiohead failed at committing commercial suicide and just created post-rock instead. Still one of their best.

  • dave

    I think Filth Pig was simply a turn toward a more metallic sound for Ministry with the real drop in quality occurring through Dark Side of the Spoon and Animositisomina.

  • BBC

    1. “Crumbs” is one of the heaviest tracks ever recorded
    2. There are some hidden gems on DSotSpoon and Animositisomia (not many)
    3. 3. Rio Grande Blood is briliant – because of Tommy Victor. I don’t think Tommy Victor has recorded a bad thing.
    4. The Deciblog is officially my favorite blog

  • D.

    Who ever things this is a dud is crazy…wtf? I love this album…silly.

  • saddleburr

    fuk ya!!! yeah they shifted gears a bit on this one, but i have always thought this album was every bit as worthy o’ worship as everything they had done up to that point (now, dark side o’ the spoon is another matter altogether). it crushed like no other bands were back then…and in fairness to stabbing westward – yes their big label debut was radio-friendly, but i saw them at the catcus club in the south bay during that tour, and their sound was soooooo much rawer live…it was the first time i really considered just how watered down a band’s sound could become with some stupid fuk’n corporate yuppie working the board (now, i can’t speak for anything that happened after that album…)

  • saddleburr

    oh, forgot…don’t have to justify SHIT on this one…

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  • Daine

    one of my favorite stoner albums

    seriously, smoke weed and listen to this album. in fact, do any sort of downer and listen to this album

  • guest

    one of my favorite albums, ever. by far my favorite ministry album. i remember buying this the day it came out when i was a kid and thinking how heavy it was…

  • Samhainkid

    i’m a pretty massive Ministry fan since the late 80′s, but yeah, i rarely spin this one. a couple of songs are pretty badass, but overall, the album left me flat. the heroin addiction may be to blame, but whatever the deal was, i just felt let down by this one. not enough dynamics for me as compared to the previous few albums. Psalm 69 will always be my fave by Al and co.

  • Idoru Blue

    agreed. amazing album. i am always surprised when i talk to people about this album and they say they hate it, just because i love it so much.

  • Austin Nutter

    I really like this album, and Rio Grande Blood, which I guess gets a good amount of hate, but it’s a good thrash album with some industrial flourishes. It looks like this album isn’t as hated as I believed.

  • KMFCM

    I listen to this one more than any of the other albums.

    Figures it’s the one everyone hates
    (I thought Animositysomnia was the dud)

  • Perkus Tooth

    I love this record. It captures the psyche of a man teetering on the abyss. The lyrics stand out for me the most and resonate more and more as I get older.
    “The failing marriage slowly grinding into nothing.”
    and
    “With a frozen dream and a borrowed hope that died.” Bleak, honest lyrics.

  • hellmut

    Like all your favorite albums, repeated listens and an understanding were the artist is at made this alongside the mind is a terrible thing to waste the most listened to out of ministry’s releases for myself.

  • Barry Convex

    Nice to see “Filth Pig” getting some love because it’s certainly one of Ministry’s best. I remember not liking it that much at first, but after getting heavily into Godflesh, I came to understand and appreciate the sludgy awesomeness of it.

  • http://apocalypticrebop.blogspot.com/ Ioannis

    i like this filthy piggy.

  • http://www.facebook.com/jeremy.burtch Jeremy Burtch

    Fuck yeah man… dug this out about 2 weeks ago and was floored. Why had I let so much time pass and why did no one else dig this? It’s heavy fucking doom pretty much.

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Jeremy-Richardson/100000509198902 Jeremy Richardson

    I like filth pig

  • Brian

    One of my favorites, but it helps to be in the right mind frame to listen to it. I put it on when I’m really depressed.

  • Jinete

    I purchase this album the day was released and loved it since then.
    Lava, laVA, LAVAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

  • Sally Sparrow

    I have to admit, I bust this one out purely because of the Lay Lady Lay cover. So despite being the most reviled album in the ministry canon, Filth Pig has a very special place in my heart (& my ipod).

    (And the cover imagery was hugely iconic to my adolescence as well…it has the fond familiarity of grandma’s quilt.)

  • Megaslamp

    The best ministry album and best quote: Then sludge. And I don’t mean Eyehategod sludge. Just toxic fucking spew

  • Adam Askov

    Best Ministry album. No competition. 

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  • Komafibre

    dude, this was my first album i bought from them, but i had heard them before this, it was 96′, I was 15. it was my move away from the popular shit like NIN, etc., really got into skinny puppy too. my own heroin addiction later in life made me understand the pain this album resonated that I could never understand at 15. Definitly “a man on the edge of the abyss”. by far the one ministry album that makes me reconnect with my lost innocence of my youth. I think there are alot of us that connect this way.

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