| Houses of the Molé | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Studio album by Ministry | ||||
| Released | June 21, 2004 | |||
| Recorded | 2003–04 at Sonic Ranch, El Paso, Texas | |||
| Genre | Industrial metal, thrash metal | |||
| Length | 55:00 52:00 (Minus silence) |
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| Label | Sanctuary/BMG (06076-84678) | |||
| Producer | Al Jourgensen | |||
| Ministry chronology | ||||
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| Professional ratings | |
|---|---|
| Review scores | |
| Source | Rating |
| Allmusic | [1] |
| The Austin Chronicle | [2] |
| PlayLouder | [3] |
| Rolling Stone | [4] |
| This table needs to be expanded using prose. See the guideline for more information. | |
Houses of the Molé is the ninth studio album by industrial metal band Ministry. The album was released on June 21, 2004 internationally and a day later in the United States through Sanctuary Records.
Contents |
The album is the 1st part of the band's anti-Bush trilogy, followed by 2006's Rio Grande Blood and 2007's The Last Sucker. It was released in the run up to the 2004 American presidential elections, with George W. Bush being president at the time of its release. Nearly all songs start with the letter "W" in their title. The first track on the album, "No W", features numerous satirical samples of Bush's speeches, particularly samples in which he spoke of his war on terror.
The musical style of the album is more speed metal-oriented than Ministry's previous releases.
Al Jourgensen has stated that the name Houses of the Molé is a tribute to the Houses of the Holy album, released by Led Zeppelin in 1973. Molé itself is a Mexican sauce made from chocolate that is nearly black in color, an image that Jourgensen believes represents crude oil.
This was the first and so far only Ministry studio album to not chart on the Billboard 200. Due to slow sales, the band left Sanctuary.
Houses of the Molé is also noteworthy for being the first Ministry LP not to feature longtime collaborator Paul Barker since Twitch in 1986. It is also the first album to use Ministry's new logo as well as their first with Mike Scaccia on guitar since 1996's Filth Pig.
Tracks 10 - 22 and 24 - 68 are silent, one-second tracks.
The song "Worm" ends at 8:11 and is followed by a minute of silence, adding on to the eventual silence leading to "Psalm 23". Jourgensen wanted the length of the last song listed on the CD to be 9:11 for obvious reasons. The same idea occurred again at the end of "Psalm 23." The song itself is 4:41 and followed by a minute of silence adding to the silence leading up to track 69, "Walrus." Cutting "Walrus" in half, making it 1:23, is the actual, raw length of the song. It is simply reversed at the exact midway point of the song, doubling the track length. "Walrus" is entirely made up of the sample used at the end of the song "Worm." The lyrics to the song are the words "Paul is not with us" reversed and played repeatedly to the end of the song. The message is a reference to the departure of former bassist Paul Barker (the use of a hidden message is also a reference to the "Paul is dead" urban legend). "Walrus" is also track 69 which is a reference to their previous album Psalm 69: The Way to Succeed and the Way to Suck Eggs. Another one of the band's albums, Dark Side of the Spoon, also had a hidden track 69.
"Psalm 23" is an alternate version of "No W" (minus the Carmina Burana samples) preceded by a mysterious, poorly recorded rendition of The Star-Spangled Banner. The source of the recording is unknown but is possible to be from a sporting event of some sort. It features a furious, Slayer-style guitar solo at the conclusion. Later versions of Houses of the Molé do not feature the version of "No W" with the Carmina Burana samples. Instead, a version of "Psalm 23" with a shortened intro is included as the first track (and labelled as "No W"). "Psalm 23" is replaced by the track "Bloodlines".
One of the samples contained at the start of "No W" is George Bush saying "Psalm 23".
| Chart (2004) | Peak position |
|---|---|
| French Albums Chart[6] | 162 |
| UK Albums Chart[7] | 135 |
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