Last month, it was announced that MINISTRY‘s upcoming tour — most recently scheduled to kick off in October — had been moved to March and April 2022. THE MELVINS and CORROSION OF CONFORMITY will now appear on all show dates as the tour’s special guests.
Each show date will celebrate 30 years of MINISTRY‘s landmark album “The Mind Is A Terrible Thing To Taste” as well as debut songs from the band’s 15th studio LP, “Moral Hygiene”, which came out October 1 via Nuclear Blast Records.
Speaking about MINISTRY‘s decision to postpone the tour, mainman Al Jourgensen told SPIN: “It’s still not safe [to go on the road] until these fucking knuckleheads do what’s right so society can function and get their fucking vaccines. There are some states on that tour where there’s less than 50% vaccination rates. [Travelling on a tour bus], you’re literally on a 45-foot-long petri dish. You have 12 people with an average of three feet of personal space in an enclosed chamber, breathing all the same stuff. While at the same time being exposed to thousands of people nightly and their droplets. It’s a recipe for disaster and nobody felt fucking safe. So hopefully by March we will be at herd immunity.”
“Moral Hygiene” was recorded with engineer Michael Rozon (also behind the boards on “AmeriKKKant”) at Scheisse Dog Studio, Jourgensen‘s self-built home studio and creative lab. As with all MINISTRY albums, all songs are written and performed by Jourgensen. Additional contributions come from Billy Morrison (BILLY IDOL, ROYAL MACHINES), Cesar Soto (MAN THE MUTE), John Bechdel (KILLING JOKE, FEAR FACTORY), Roy Mayorga (STONE SOUR, SOULFLY, NAUSEA), Paul D’Amour (TOOL, FEERSUM ENNJIN), Arabian Prince (N.W.A.), Jello Biafra (DEAD KENNEDYS) and sitar player Flash.
The album’s first single, “Good Trouble”, was released in early July. The song, inspired by the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests and the activist work of the late congressman John Lewis, was accompanied by a video that includes sampling from last year’s demonstrations in Los Angeles as captured by Jourgensen and his partner Liz Walton.
Jourgensen told Australia’s Heavy about the “Moral Hygiene” musical direction: “Same old stuff. Just a progression of the MINISTRY sound that’s been refined for the last 30 [or] 40 years. And I think we hit a good one this time. There’s a couple that I wish I could have back, and there’s a couple that I’m really gung-ho about. But this one’s in the ‘gung-ho’ category. This one makes a lot of sense for the times that we’re living in.”
As for the lyrical themes covered on “Moral Hygiene”, Jourgensen said: “We cover everything — from the actual pandemic to climate change to the political climate now. And I don’t mean so much the politicians as much as the rise of fascist tendencies all over the world and in various countries. And a lot of life topics like that.”
