Steve Albini (Shellac) Turner Hall March 2020

Racer-X was Big Black’s third EP, a tight collection of industrial noise-core tracks. Appearing on the EP with Albini were two members of Naked Raygun: Santiago Durango (guitar) and Jeff Pezzati (bass) – it would be Pezzati’s last time playing on a Big Black recording. Albini has both guitar and vocal credits. Drums performed by “Roland” (a Roland TR-606 drum machine). My top tracks are “The Ugly American” (featuring John Bonhen on saxophone) and the snarled funk of both “Deep Six” and the cover of James Brown’s “The Big Payback” but really all six tracks are killer.

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Allmusic says about the album “The Land of Rape and Honey represented Ministry’s stylistic breakthrough, combining assaultive percussion, samples, synths, and (sometimes) crunching guitars with distorted, barking vocals. For all the emphasis on the group’s metal/industrial fusion, it’s really only the first three (and best) tracks on Rape and Honey – “Stigmata,” “The Missing,” and “Deity” – that employ guitars extensively. The remainder of the album merely suggests heavy metal aggression through its electronic and sampled elements; it is far more industrial in feel, even though it’s just as dark. Ministry was the industrial band that, more than any other, appealed to metal fans, and it was The Land of Rape and Honey that began to lay claim to that status.”

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Some Great Reward was Depeche Mode’s fourth album and it reached #5 in the UK and #54 in the US. The first single, “People are People,” was released about six months prior, in March of ‘84, and became DM’s breakthrough in the US market where it hit #13 (and #4 in UK) with the support of its video on heavy rotation on MTV – where I saw it and was instantly in love. The sado-maschocistic industrial dance track “Master and Servant” was the second single from Some Great Reward and, despite the controversy surrounding its material and ban on many US radio stations (I guess the synthesized whips and chains were a bit too over the top for our tender ears), it made it to #87 on the US charts and #9 in the UK. The last two singles were actually a double A-side of “Blasphemous Rumors” and “Somebody.” “Blasphemous Rumors” is, to me, their most disturbing song and one that I often find unlistenable, not because it’s bad but because it’s ridiculously painful. “Somebody” – notable for being the first DM single sung by Martin Gore (reportedly recorded nude) is also painful, but in a completely different way – it’s the desperate agony and ache of love vs. the devastation of depression, sickness, death and loss of faith.

Allmusic says about Some Great Reward “The peak of the band’s industrial-gone-mainstream fusion, and still one of the best electronic music albums yet recorded, Some Great Reward still sounds great, with the band’s ever-evolving musical and production skills matching even more ambitious songwriting from Martin Gore. “People Are People” appears here, but finds itself outclassed by some of Depeche Mode’s undisputed classics, most especially the moody, beautiful “Somebody,” a Gore-sung piano ballad that mixes its wit and emotion skillfully; “Master and Servant,” an amped-up, slamming dance track that conflates sexual and economic politics to sharp effect; and the closing “Blasphemous Rumors,” a slow-building anthemic number supporting one of Gore’s most cynical lyrics, addressing a suicidal teen who finds God only to die soon afterward. Even lesser-known tracks like the low-key pulse of “Lie to Me” and the weirdly dreamy “It Doesn’t Matter” showcase an increasingly confident band. Alan Wilder’s arrangements veer from the big to the stripped down, but always with just the right touch, such as the crowd samples bubbling beneath “Somebody” or the call/response a cappella start to “Master and Servant.” With Reward, David Gahan’s singing style found the métier it was going to stick with for the next ten years, and while it’s never gone down well with some ears, it still has a compelling edge to it that suits the material well.”

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Critically Construction Time Again received mixed reviews. Allmusic says it “is a bit hit and miss nonetheless, but when it does hit, it does so perfectly…The album’s clear highlight has to be ‘Everything Counts,’ a live staple for years, combining a deceptively simple, ironic lyric about the music business with a perfectly catchy but unusually arranged blending of more metallic scraping samples and melodica amid even more forceful funk/hip-hop beats. Elsewhere, on ‘Shame’ and “Told You So,’ Gore’s lyrics start taking on more of the obsessive personal relationship studies that would soon dominate his writing. Wilder’s own songwriting contributions are fine musically, but lyrically, “preachy” puts it mildly, especially the environment-friendly ‘The Landscape Is Changing.’” PopMatters says “Mostly, though, CTA serves as a stylistic bridge. As such, it’s the most awkward, and perhaps worst, studio album in the Depeche Mode discography” while Rolling Stone gives it either a 2 or 3 star rating (out of 5), Smash Hits a 7 star (out of 10) and Spin a 2 star (out of 10). I obviously wholeheartedly disagree and find Construction Time Again to still be totally relevant and a fantastic listen 35 years later.

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Opening for Ministry were The God Bombs from New York, young and traditional industrialists whose sound better matched old Ministry than new Ministry. After their set, Joe made the observation that The God Bombs opening for Ministry was akin to 1980′s Stray Cats opening for 1950′s Carl Perkins (I’m not sure that ever really happened) in that there is a 30 year difference in the emergence and popularity of the genres and it’s also the approximate age variant between the performers. Which made us and our friends feel really fucking old.

Also performing before Ministry was Chelsea Wolfe, who I guess is a big deal (her track “Feral Love“ was featured in the trailers for the fourth season of Game of Thrones). Super-heavy ambient goth, like Cocteau Twins wearing 100 pound cement boots.

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“Everything Counts” has always been one of my favorite DM tracks – it appears on their 1983 album Construction Time Again – the harmoniously sweet chorus belying the venom of the lyrics which decry corporate greed. The B-side, “Work Hard,” is a truly industrial dance track, with synth, machine clanks and a dark drum machine beat.

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Songs is not an easy record to listen to – it’s rage on vinyl, darker than midnight, violent and anxiety-producing (my heart rate has noticeably increased just listening to it). “Fish Fry,” seems innocuous enough at the start, the title Midwest-adorable, the beat a bit bouncy, but then atonal guitar dissonance screams through with a tale about a murder after a fish fry. Another song, “Columbian Necktie,” details a particularly brutal form of killing and “Kasimir S. Pulaski Day” a mobster shooting. “Bad Penny” is about the scenester asshole that sleeps with all the girlfriends. Conclusion: people suck. Thank goodness for the cover of Kraftwerk’s “The Model” which provides some lyrical relief – just a model, being beautiful, drinking champagne, no blood or violence.

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I am Benito
I am Benito
I am Benito
And I like my job
They gave me this house
And gave me this car
They gave me the cities and streets
When they gave me this job
I am Benito
And I like my job
I am Benito
And I like my job
I am Benito
I am Benito
I am Benito
I like my job

“Big Money,” a track that appears on their full-length Atomizer release, is equally brutal in sonic intensity and furious rage at an inegalitarian and flawed capitalist system.

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