Review by Rexorcist for Ministry - The Land of Rape and Honey (1988)

I swear I've heard this album before, but it's not on my log for some reason.  That Kind of annoys me, so I'm fixing that right now.  I know I did at some point, because I remember thinking to myself, "this album is certainly not metal enough to be industrial metal."  I didn't get that with the other Ministry albums; I all tagged the properly.  And after listening to it, I still feel that way.  I can't really vote on that, though, so forget the hall for now.

So the album seems to almost be more punk than metal, and its repetition is both aesthetically appealing to a punk fan like me, but also a bit disappointing concerning the other electro-industrial bands at the time who focused more on composition, like Skinny Puppy and Front Line Assembly.  I was pretty happy when the more psychedelic route was taken on Golden Dawn, but I felt the twist came a little late.  But I can really get behind that proud independent power.  Instead of focusing on dancing, it's basically pumping you up to the max.  And while melody can sometimes DRASTICALLY suffer for this, the shouted vocals and raw abrasion can still satisfy.  I gotta say, I love that mutant army vocal effect on You Know What You Are.

I like my industrial music with a little more melody, but this certainly sufficed otherwise.  Hardcore punk attitude, great vocal effects and some good noisy production make this an improvement over Twitch.