Year: 2024
Total Time: 42.34
Label: Nuclear Blast

MINISTRY or otherwise Al Jourgensen’s personal project (vocals, guitars, programming, samples) have been around since 1981. Of course, then they played Synth Pop and their shift to the Industrial Metal sound came in 1989 with their magnificent fourth album “The Mind Is A Terrible Thing To Taste”. Anyone who lived in the early 90s will remember the superhit “N.W.O.” from the legendary fifth album ‘ΚΕΦΑΛΗΞΘ’   which had dominated the whole music scene due to the great promotion from MTV. Indeed, I have to admit that this song put me into Industrial, being a fan of MINISTRY to this day!

Now the years have passed and, in the year 2024, they present us their sixteenth full album “Hopium For The Masses” which contains nine songs, including an awesome cover of “Ricky’s Hand” by FAD GADGET! Al Jourgensen (currently 66 years old) works with a bunch of talented musicians including Monte Pittman and Cesar Soto on guitars, John Bechdel on keyboards, Roy Mayorga on drums and Paul D’Amour on bass and with collaborators as Eugene Gogol Bordello’s Hutz on “Cult Of Suffering” – which is the worst song on the album in my opinion – Jello Biafra on the amazing “Aryan Embarrassment” and CORROSION OF CONFORMITY frontman Pepper Keenan on the also very good “Goddamn White Trash”.

The rest of the album moves at the same high levels in pure Industrial Metal paths, giving an emphasis on endless but at the same time impressive sampling! It is definitely a much better album than their previous “Moral Hygiene” (for me this was the worst of their career)! Al stated for the numerous time (since 2003 he has been saying it) that this will be MINISTRY’s last album. I don’t think that anyone believes him any more…..For now let’s settle for “Hopium For The Masses” which is really worth listening and buying, whether you’re a fan of this band or not!

Rating: 7/10
Editor: Dimitris Argyrakis
Related Link MINISTRY – Facebook Page