Ministry - Twitch

Label: Sire
Catologue Number: 25309-11
Format: CD
Date: 1986
Style: Techno-Industrial / Synthpop
Rating: 6/10
Reviewer: Sidney James

Before Ministry turned into the cyber metal gods they are to day, Ministry had been a rather dubious Electro-pop band more Howard Jones than Depeche Mode. The album that was released under that incarnation With Sympathy is an embarrassing stain that Al Jourgensen has tried to remove through out his musical career. Twitch was Al’s first attempt to distance him from the new romantic image he has so successfully portrayed on his debut release.

The over-riding influence on Twitch is the sound of the then new and underground European Electronic Body Music scene, and in particular Front 242. A band that Al had began to collaborate with on the Revolting Cocks side project and whose vocalist Richard 23 appears on the track Angel. The sound that dominates Twitch is that of hard electronic bass lines and slamming drums topped with snarling vocals and a bucket load of samples.

The album kicks off in storming fashion with Just Like You, an vague attack on the American political system combined with a the heavy electronic undertow and sampled voices joining in with Al’s Chorus of disapproval. The musical theme is continued with We Believe. Both tracks can be seen as forming the template for the industrial dance sound that would become the staple of the Wax Trax label (Part ran by Al Jourgensen) and would later form the basis for Nine Inch Nails’ Pretty Hate Machine.

The next four tracks All Day, Angel and Over the Shoulder and My Possession have more in common with Ministry’s With Sympathy era, but with a harder edge. Angel still rates as one of the best Electro pop songs written in the Eighties. A almost dream like quality is produced and Richard 23’s vocals float beautifully around the song.

The rest of the album returns to the hard electronic dance sound of Just Like you. The real stand out track being isle of Man, a rant against mankind’s ecological damage to the world. It’s a shame this track only appears on the CD version of the album because it was several years until I actually got to hear how good it was. The strangest track on the album is Crash and Burn, which is the closest Ministry, has come to producing an Electro noise piece. The whole track sounds like the equipment was pushed to the point of collapse and it probably was.

Twitch is not the best place to start your Ministry collection, but it does act as an interesting relic of how Ministry developed from being an awful New Romantic synthpop band to become one of the heaviest and influential industrial rock bands in contemporary music.