Go ahead and call it a guilty pleasure; as a lifelong
music collector, fan, disc jockey and reviewer, I enjoy music books, bios and
histories. I have trafficked; bought, sold, traded and collected literally
thousands, of albums, 45s, CDs, cassettes, videos, books, magazines, and just
about every form of music collectable known to man over the past 40 years. I
have attended somewhere north of 600 concerts; met and interviewed legends,
baby bands, wannabes and has-beens.
So it is from that perspective that I review Ministry: The Lost Gospels According to Al
Jourgensen, by Jourgensen, with Jon Weiderhorn. It is also from
that perspective that I call BULLSHIT! One look at Jougensen’s visage on the
cover and you automatically know that this is not a normal, average guy; but I’ve
gotta tell you that if half of what he claims in the book is true, you’d have
to wonder how he managed to live to tell the tale.
Granted,
among those claims are some full on brushes and downright collisions with the
grim reaper, but that being said, it’s still hard to believe a lot of
Jourgensen’s tales of excess. I have always wondered how so many fabled rockers
have penned biographies that detail their drug and alcohol fueled decline and
yet seem to be able to rattle on in deep detail despite their self inflicted
full on assault on brain cells.
While
Jougensen’s high opinion of himself is not unique among rock stars, he displays
an oddly twisted point of view about his fellow musicians labeling his
non-inbibbing band mates “the book club” and his fellow addicts great guys and
geniuses. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that Ministry: The Lost Gospels According to Al Jourgensen has a
disjointed, scattered narrative, bouncing around in both location, time frame
and the characters involved that will leave your head spinning.
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