Ministry’s Al Jourgensen has revealed that he will be reuniting with a key ex-bandmate for the first time in more than 20 years to record what he says will be the band’s final album.
Speaking exclusively to Metal Hammer, Jourgensen says the follow-up to the band’s current album, Hopiumforthemasses, will be his final release under the Ministry name after more than 40 years fronting the band.
“There's only so far you can go before you bore yourself to death,” he says of his decision to bring Ministry to an end. “Do it until you puke, you know? And I don't want to get to that puke point. I'm going to be pre-emptive.”
- "Jean-Michel Jarre said he loved my music, but that I was too acoustic for him. That got me thinking": Urged on by fans, Mike Oldfield’s final album was a look back to his early years
- “We were weeping like little babies, trying to figure out whether to continue, and if so how”: How HIM pulled back from the brink to make their final album Tears On Tape
The frontman also adds that he will be reuniting with former Ministry bassist/co-producer Paul Barker, who was the sole constant member of band alongside Jourgensen from 1986 to 2003, playing on such landmark albums as 1988’s The Land Of Rape And Honey, 1989’s The Mind Is A Terrible Thing To Taste and 1992’s Psalm 69: The Way To Succeed Or The Way To Suck Eggs.
Barker left the band following the tour in support of 2003’s Animositisomina, with Jourgensen telling Metal Hammer in 2006 that his ex-bandmate was “old news”. But the pair rekindled their friendship in 2018, and now they plan to work together on Ministry’s swansong album.
“It's set in stone,” Jourgensen tells Metal Hammer. “We're going to be working on this album for the next year in between Ministry tours. He's not going to come on tour with us, that's [ex-Tool bassist] Paul D'Amour. But when we're done with the touring schedule over the next year, me and Paul are going to be working in my studio on the final album.
Jourgensen continues: “He's coming back into the fold to get us over that final hump of doing something that you haven't heard from Ministry in 20 or 30 years. We had a really good writing relationship in the 90s and we work well in the studio together. I think it's the perfect way to go out, wrapping a bow on the entire Ministry career, doing one final world tour and we're done.”
Speaking about his post-Ministry plans, Jourgensen says that he intends to focus on soundtrack work – including a documentary on Martin Scorsese’s recent movie Killers Of The Flower Moon.
“I want to do film scores and activism and things that interest me,” he says. “I just got done with a documentary, which is a follow up to Killers Of The Flower Moon, with [Leonardo] DiCaprio narrating it. I have so much film score work to do right now. I want to retire, but I want to keep pushing and progressing."
Ministry‘s penultimate album, Hopiumforthemasses, is out now.
