Jan-Simon: Is it possible there is a single Lords of Metal reader who has not heard of Ministry yet? I can hardly imagine it, Al Jourgensen and friends have been firing their industrial metal at us in almost unchanged format for more than twenty years now. The band may change continuously, but the music remains the same. It definitely has its pros: each time a new Ministry album is released it is pretty easy to predict what it will sound like. The present live CD, recorded during the CU Latour that led Ministry through 21 countries from March to July 19th 2008 is no real surprise either. The last CD was called ‘The Last Sucker’ and according to Jourgensen it would be the final studio album. The CU Latour was to be a farewekk tour and Ministry would officially be finished at July 18th 2008. Because of the overwhelming interest an extra concert was organized in Dublin and Ministry existed for one more day. It was clear that this tour would be well documented and the first results now lay before us: ‘Adios… Putas Madres’ is a live album for which shows were recorded in Serbia, Poland, Germany, Czech Republik, Slovakia and the USA. A DVD version will follow later this year, as welll as a documentary feature film.
The main question is: is this a worthy goodbye to a special band? A difficult question. A live album recorded in six different countries is not exactly a standard live album. Actually it is not always clear that ‘Adios’ is a live album. Between the tracks you can hear some crowd noise and an announcement of the next track. That is not much, too little if you ask me and in some cases it is only with a lot of effort you can hear the difference between the original studio versions and the livetracks. One could say it is well done to play it this accurate live, but as a visitor to a concert you would like to have something extra. Else you can just as well play the cd again or turn on the iPod. The thirteen tracks on ‘Adios… Putas Madres’ can easily be divided in three groups. First we hear five tracks from The Last Sucker, followed by four from Houses of the Molé and finally four from Rio Grande Blood. The tracks from the First two albums are even played in exactly the same order as on the studio recording.
I do not think it is a coincidence all tracks are from Ministry’s anti-George Bush trilogy van Ministry and in a way ‘Adios… Putas Madres’ is by its tracklist a goodbye to the 43rd president of the United States as well. A pity though that because of Jourgensen’s obsession with George W. Bush we do not get to hear any of the earlier work of Ministry. Because of all the 9/11 rants and the American politics of recent years you could forget Ministry has made a few amazing recordings in the early 1990s such as ‘Land of Rape and Honey’ and ‘Psalm 69’. I would have loved to have something from those albums played on this record, but no such luck. Another point of criticism, the recordings sound a bit thinny. At ‘The Last Sucker’ the First five songs sounds lots better: fuller and heavier than in this live rendition.
It would have been great if Ministry had closed down with a real killer record. Unfortunately, ‘Adios… Putas Madres’ is no such record. It is an adequate sampler of the last three studio albums, but it is not much more than that. Perhaps that the live experience is better caught on the upcoming dvd’s, but what remains now is the uneasy feeling that Ministry - and most of all the fans - could have wished for a better farewell album.
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