Ministry’s newest album, the strangely titled The Squirrely Years Revisited has more or less been savaged online for being “unnecessary” or as an “Easy cash grab.” All of that may be true, but the fact of that matter, I liked this album a lot.

The record finds Al Jourgensen re-recording material taken from the first Ministry single through the band’s second album. Of course, the earliest stuff is, or was, very synth poppy (albeit with a slight goth vibe). By the time they got to their second album, Twitch modern industrial Ministry was starting to take shape, but was not fully formed. Al himself has distanced himself particularly from Ministry’s first LP, With Sympathy wherein he states he faced enormous label pressure to be more commercial and was strong armed into singing in an English accent.

That is, until Cruel World Fest threw enough bucks at Al to play the early material live. Since then, Al has been accepting that even his fans mostly the love the record and has come to at least tolerate early Ministry. The Squirrely Years Revisited, a title which I still don’t understand as to how it applies to early, major label Ministry, is basically a studio re-recording of the songs from the live set.

I expected for Al to industrial-ize up the tunes and make them fit more in line with a mind is a terrible thing to taste. He doesn’t. Really, the majority of songs here retain their synth-pop essence and the band maybe speeds them up a little, puts a little more whomp into the drums, and maybe drops a harder sound effect here or there- but if anything, these songs are mostly their classic version was they would be performed live… but in the studio. And frankly, they sound really good.

Al’s voice in particular sounds very good… a little too good. Al has been screaming and barking for decades, so it is amazing that his voice here, instantly returns to his early, youthful coo- especially since the English accent is mostly retained here. He sounds spot on and perfect, tone wise and technique wise. I was concerned about some shenanigans going on behind the scene, but I was relieved to hear on the new cut if “Effigy,” Al sing “My mom and my dad.” On the original, in his faux English accent, he purposefully sings “Me mum and me dad.” The fact is, if there were shenanigans going on, this would be masterful misdirect by a producer to cover up “the story” of the new record. I just don’t think any by-the-hour producer would put in that much effort. So, it seems Al really is a walking miracle, as if we didn’t already know.

Perhaps the Twitch material doesn’t fare as well. Since the band was moving towards industrial at the point, and since the actual songwriting on Twitch isn’t as strong, those tracks come off a little more as generic industrial than the perfect craft of the earlier tunes. The whole record really is just the setlist from Ministry’s most recent (and excellent) retro tour, and it’s a lot of fun to hear Al embrace the earliest stuff. If anything, it’s a non-live, live record of the most recent tour and it’s enjoyable to have a piece of that memorialized. Is it “unnecessary?” Maybe… but since when does art need to be “necessary?” Isn’t the purpose of art that it doesn’t NEED to have a function, and that is what makes it art? Anyway, the record mostly pops and is a lot of fun… if you like early Ministry. But I’ll tell you what isn’t necessary… the weird title.