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So, let's say that “Psalm 69:The Way To Succeed And The Way To Suck Eggs” from 1992 was the ultimate farewell of Ministry, unfortunately, the farewell extended until 2006 with this “Rio Grande Blood,” and who knows how much longer it will go on.
The only skill that seems to be left for Al Jourgensen and company is to grind riffs, feedback, and Slayer-like guitar licks into an inconsistent ensemble sprinkled here and there with those samples and industrial sounds that had once made them one of the greatest bands to emerge from the fertile ground of the USA underground.
Not that anyone expected a new “The Land Of Rape And Honey” or any further evolution from a group that has already given everything to music, but the metal and hardcore turn evidenced by this album and already initially sketched in the previous “Houses Of The Molé” (which now, in some ways, seems much more enjoyable, perhaps because in hindsight, we realized that the worst was yet to come with the next album) demonstrates how Ministry have lost faith in their extraordinary sound and original subversive charge, preferring to hitch onto the bandwagon of metal winners and anyone who exploits populist anti-Bush rhetoric to pursue that single leitmotif that the entertainment industry and all the entourage around it have now elevated to a lifestyle: money.
Oh yes, money...
It could not be otherwise, considering the title track of this album which, besides tumbling through a typical obsolete series of beats, various percussions, voices, and guitars that wink at the worst, as well as the most predictable, thrash and speed metal, is filled with middle school proclamations like “I want your money” or “I’m a dangerous, dangerous man with dangerous, dangerous weapons” aimed at their most illustrious fellow countryman: George “bla bla bla” Bush. Ministry seems to rely on that fake-rebel formula built on the generic chatter of posers that has made great bands full of inanities like System Of A Down: those flashes of light, those brilliant strokes of genius to which their pre-thrash metal era albums had us accustomed now no longer exist. Forgotten.
Now there are only the Slayer-style riffs in “Senor Peligro” and the distorted vocalizations that scream “coram populi” lyrics in the best Ministry tradition. The problem is that Allen “Mr. Alien” Jourgensen in recent albums seems to be increasingly focused on fighting his personal crusade against the world rather than paying attention to what he plays: come on, the reference points of “Rio Grande Blood” are the same albums you can find in the CD player of your thirteen-year-old brother angry in his Slipknot t-shirt et cetera (“Lieslieslies,” “Fear (Is Big Business)”). Really a low blow. Like the vertiginous drop of “Palestina” the umpteenth track that apes nu-metal.
We're at the paradox: Ministry, among the first to mix heavy metal and punk electronics, are copying the stuff played by the many degenerate offspring of their own music! Even the guests, above all Jello Biafra of Dead Kennedys on “Ass Clown,” neither add nor detract anything from the overall value of the album, their performances are completely anonymous and bland. Among the most beautiful gems of the album are the "symphonic" “Khyber Pass” and “Yellow Cake,” with the brilliant use of guitars and sounds with electro reminiscences that interpenetrate to create delirious, epileptic, luciferian techno music.
Two tracks that give us a free regret, making us reflect on what this album could have been with a pinch more inventiveness (which these Texans by adoption certainly do not lack) and a touch less tedious banality.
Tracklist Lyrics Samples and Videos
02 Señor Peligro (03:38)
Señor Peligro
Bush's alter ego
A family of danger
And that's his middle name
Invasion is imminent
Keeping down the dissidents
Killing is his business
And business is game
[Chorus]
Justification
To Cross the Border
Justification
For Law and Order
Justification
To Cross the Rio
Señor Peligro
Señor Peligro
Lost all his amigos
From Chile to Panama
And all points in between
Exploitation
To feed the Corporations
The driving force of any war
Is always based in Greed
Venezuela
Watch your Back
Señor Peligro is on the attack
[Voice Over (Isa Martinez - signed release):]
El Presidente Bush es un Asesino
No cambiaremos sangre por aceite
Gente muriendo por el amor del dinero
Soportarlo es mas gas para el fuego
Preparate para el Señor Peligro
[English translation:
The President is an assassin
We will not exchange blood for oil
People dying for the love of money
Supporting him is fuel to the fire
Prepare for Mr. Danger]
05 LiesLiesLies (05:16)
''Gentlemen we have called you together to inform you that we
are going to overthrow the United States government.
Do you still think that jet fuel brought down the World Trade Center?''
''Does anybody else see a problem here?
If the government has nothing to hide why are
they so afraid toanswer a few questions?
This story does not add up''
I'm on a mission to never forget
3,000 people that I've never met
We want some answers and all that we get
Some kind of shit about a terrorist threat
Lies Lies Lies Lies Lies Lies Lies
Lies Lies Lies Lies Lies Lies Lies
Lies Lies Lies Lies Lies Lies Lies
Surpise Surprise Surprise
Lies Lies
I'm on a mission to dig up the truth
You think we're stupid and there's no proof
Well let me tell you that the time has come
To pull the trigger on the smoking gun
Lies Lies Lies Lies Lies Lies Lies
Lies Lies Lies Lies Lies Lies Lies
Lies Lies Lies Lies Lies Lies Lies
Surpise Surprise Surprise
Lies Lies Lies Lies
Don't listen to me, listen to your head
Don't listen
Don't listen to anything, they've said
Don't listen
Lies Lies Lies Lies
''America has been hijacked
Not by Al Qaeda, not by Bin Laden
But by a group of tyrants
That should be of great concern to all Americans''
I'm on a mission to bring out the facts
You got your stories but they all have cracks
Misinformation, lies and deceit
What made you think that we were all asleep
Lies Lies Lies Lies Lies Lies Lies
Lies Lies Lies Lies Lies Lies Lies
Lies Lies Lies Lies Lies Lies Lies
Surpise Surprise Surprise
Lies Lies Lies Lies
Don't listen to me, listen to your head
Don't listen
Don't listen to anything, they've said
Don't listen
Lies Lies Lies Lies
Don't listen to me, listen to your head
Lies Lies Lies Lies
07 Yellow Cake (04:35)
''...and war goes on...
...and war goes on...''
There's no crisis of conscience
The truth is dressed in disguise
Feeding the hungry with Yellow Cake
Feeding the public with lies
Yellow Cake
No crimes were ever committed
No charges were ever read
Cooking the books on the Yellow Cake
Cooking a meal for the dead
Yellow Cake
''...and war goes on...
...and war goes on...''
This is no time for the righteous
Only the wicked survive
Bake up a batch of the Yellow Cake
Bake up a batch of the lies
Yellow Cake
Yellow Cake
Yellow Cake
Yellow Cake
08 Palestina (03:18)
Palestina was a very nice girl
She liked to travel and sample the world
Palestina has a first hand view of life
Palestina from a very young age
Saw the oppression, felt the rage
Palestina wants out of her cage to fight
My life will be short and sweet
Palestina told her family and friends
She'd be back, to take her revenge
Palestina made up her mind to die
Palestina had a belt of death
She had explosives strapped to her chest
Palestina is a martyr now in the sky
My life will be short and sweet
Bye
My life will be short and sweet
My life will be short and sweet
10 Khyber Pass (07:31)
Where's Bin Laden
Where's Bin Laden
He's prob'ly runnin'
Prob'ly hidin'
Some say he's livin' at the Khyber Pass
Others say he's at the Bushes ranch
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Other reviews
By Dimitri Molotov
"An album can be great even if, compared to the band’s other works, it presents many, too many differences."
"After all, Al loves to experiment with new influences for his albums, and in my opinion, this time it resulted in a record by no means contemptible."
