Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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14 of 15 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Easily their best since 'Psalm 69', Industrial Metal genius, 24 Jul 2004
The previous reviewer has beaten me to the punch, but 'Houses Of The Molé' (another brilliant title by the way, slightly less obvious than 'Dark Side Of The Spoon' though, so how many manage to spot the reference this time remains to be seen!) is the best Ministry album since 'Psalm 69'. The albums between this and 1992's illustrious Industrial masterpiece have all had their moments and high points, but as a whole they have been let down by mainman Al Jourgensen's copious substance consumption. However, he rises above his problems here, notably the departure of long-time right hand man Paul Barker to produce an album to reaffirm faith in the Industrial Metal genre. The opening track 'No W' with it's sampled and looped extract from Carl Orff's notorious 'Carmina Burana' (the theme from the Old Spice adverts!) is possibly the band's best song in their existence. Obviously an update of the classic N.W.O. from 'Psalm 69', it shares that songs title (though rearranged), penchant for crushing riffs and George Bush samples (though George W in this case, rather than his father). It's an absolutely stunning way to open an album and isn't matched throughout the rest of the record, though some other tracks such as 'Waiting' and 'Warp City' do run it close. If you're a fan of any kind of crushing music, you need to get yourself a copy of this album as soon as possible as the overlords of Industrial Metal are back and they're in the form of their lives.
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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Al's mad as hell!!....., 20 Jul 2004
....and he's not going to take it anymore!! Seems the Hunter S. Thompson of rock 'n' roll has got a fire lit under his ass as never before. While it's a shame that the strange new paths tentatively opened up on "Animositisomina" aren't explored any further, "Houses..." has more pressing concerns than innovation or artistry. This is an album at WAR, goddamnit, and musical imagination is irrelevant when you're in this mindset...God, I love Ministry. Any idiot band can be 'angry' or 'aggressive' or even 'hateful' but only Ministry can be truly...ugly. Take any random track here - say, "Warp City" - and you'll find something so out-of-control it sounds like it could (and would) actually hurt you. The opening "No W" is so ridiculously powerful, in fact, that it almost overshadows the rest of the album!...Over slashed shreds of "Carmina Burena", it builds to such a frenzied boiling point that by the end you really feel as though you're being strafed by jet fighters on all sides. Elsewhere, "World" has a gigantic, lumbering tech-step rhythm Godflesh would be proud of. "WTV" is a fairly obvious "TV II" rewite but blows you away anyhow, with a series of starts, stops, roars, judders and belches, while TV commercials gibber inanities in the background and El Jourgo's vocals reach the apoplectic heights of Today Is The Day's Steve Austin. The closing "Worm" is something new. Over a plodding drumbeat and stray sax bleats floats a weirdly wistful melody that definitely has the ghost of Faith No More lurking somewhere round about it, the overall picture painted being that of a bunch of people rather half-heartedly trying to throw a party amidst the ruins of a nuclear wasteland. But that's the only hint of respite. The rest, it's music to lynch Republicans from lampposts to.
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Psalm 69 revisited? Not quite..., 18 Feb 2005
There'd been a certain amount of quiet expectation about this album as a spiritual successor to 'Psalm 69'. In the same way that album was led by anger at George Bush senior's war in Iraq, so this album was led by his son's crusade. The sad fact of it is that the lead track of this album ("No W" - No Dubya, a follow up to Psalm 69's "NWO" - New World Order) is probably the weakest track of the album. It samples heavily from 'Carmina Burana' (used much more successfully by Apoptygma Bezerk on 'Love never Dies'), and the listener gets the feeling that Al put so much effort into creating a worthy successor to his undeniably classic NWO that he tried too hard and it didn't pay off. That's a shame, because the rest of the album *is* a worthy successor to Psalm 69; tracks like 'Warning' and 'Worthless' are solid, crisp, industrial metal like only Ministry on form produce. No, this album doesn't have anything to match the deranged genius of 'Jesus built my Hotrod', but it's got a lot of tracks that fit nicely against the best that they were producing ten years ago, and Houses of the Mole will fit neatly into my selection of driving music with no trauma whatsoever. Not their best, but then again they were never going to cap Psalm 69 anyway. Worth your money.
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