Ministry: Dark Side Of The Spoon : Music Reviews : Rolling Stone

Album Reviews

Ministry's Al Jourgensen hasn't updated his methodology since 1992's brilliant Psalm 69, on which he and collaborator Paul Barker synthesized aggro-disco beats and heavy-metal instrumentation into the ultimate in industrial dance music. 1996's Filth Pig merely plodded in its predecessor's tracks; now Dark Side of the Spoon sinks into the same complacent rut. From the stentorian rhythms and predictably ghoulish vocal samples to the bellowed doomsday incantations and chugging wall of guitars, everything here feels like a reflex. Especially irksome is the hectoring, more-decadent-than-thou formula that leads Jourgensen to sneer, "I'd like to apologize to all my wonderful fans for sticking by me through such troubled times/I love all you so much/I wish I could take you all to the Betty Ford clinic." Spoon is the sound of a great band slipping into a self-induced coma: When Jourgensen wails, "I always wake up angry/Because I always wake up me" ("Eureka Pile"), the only plausible response is to hit the snooze button. (RS 815)

NEVA CHONIN