The Land of Rape and Honey

The Land of Rape and Honey
Studio album by Ministry
Released October 11, 1988
Recorded 1985 at Southern Studios, London ("Abortive")
1987–1988 at Chicago Trax Studios
Genre Industrial rock, industrial metal
Length 40:24
Label Sire/Warner Bros.
25799
Producer Hypo Luxa, Hermes Pan, Eddie Echo
Ministry chronology
Twelve Inch Singles (1981–1984)
(1987)		 The Land of Rape and Honey
(1988)		 The Mind Is a Terrible Thing to Taste
(1989)
Singles from The Land of Rape and Honey
  1. "Stigmata"
    Released: 1988
  2. "Flashback"
    Released: 1989
  3. "The Land of Rape and Honey"
    Released: 1989
Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
AllMusic[1]
Robert ChristgauB+[2]
The Rolling Stone Album Guide[3]

The Land of Rape and Honey is the third studio album by industrial metal band Ministry, released in 1988 on Sire Records. This album is the band's first attempt at mixing industrial with rock, as opposed to more electronically influenced previous albums, although only the first three tracks use guitars extensively.[4] This also marks the inclusion of bassist Paul Barker, who would remain in Ministry as a member alongside Al Jourgensen until his departure in 2004.

The album title comes from the slogan of Tisdale, Saskatchewan, whose motto is "The Land of Rape and Honey", the local economy being based on the agricultural products rapeseed and honey.[5] The band chose the name after seeing the slogan on a souvenir mug.[6]

The album cover is an electronically processed image of a burned corpse in the Leipzig-Thekla subcamp of Buchenwald.[7] Jourgensen took a picture of the holocaust from a documentary on television and distorted the image himself. It was originally rejected by the record label but they later changed their mind after Jourgensen presented a head of a roadkilled deer he had found on the road; he cut off the head, put it in his truck, drove from Austin to Los Angeles, went into the Sire Records building, threw the deer on the desk of the head of the art department and said, "here's your new fucking [album] cover."[8]

The track "Stigmata" is featured in Richard Stanley's 1990 science fiction thriller Hardware, although the band shown apparently performing the track is actually Gwar.

The album was certified Gold by the RIAA in January 1996.[9] The album was out of print for a few years in the early 2000s, but was re-issued by Wounded Bird Records in 2007. This re-issue is misprinted, labeling the title track "The Land of Milk and Honey."

In 2016, Al Jourgensen cites The Land of Rape and Honey as his favorite Ministry album.[10] He added that he was inspired to create "word cut-ups" from the works of Allen Toussaint and William S. Burroughs. Bands like Fear Factory, Linkin Park, Slipknot and Nine Inch Nails cite this album as major influence.[11]

Track listing

All tracks written by Ministry. 

No.TitleLength
1."Stigmata"  5:45
2."The Missing"  2:55
3."Deity"  3:20
4."Golden Dawn"  5:42
5."Destruction"  3:30
6."Hizbollah"  3:58
7."The Land of Rape and Honey"  5:10
8."You Know What You Are"  4:43
9."I Prefer"  2:15
10."Flashback"  4:50
11."Abortive"  4:23

Samples

  1. "Golden Dawn"
  2. "Hizbollah"
  3. "You Know What You Are"
  4. "Flashback"
    • "Now hold up, man!" "Do it," "Everybody's got to die sometime," "I'm hurtin' real bad inside" - Platoon
  5. "Abortive"
    • "T minus 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4; we've got the main engine start—we have main...", "America's first space shuttle!" "And the shuttle has cleared the tower." - NASA

Personnel

Ministry

Additional personnel

Chart positions

Chart (1988) Peak
position
The Billboard 200[12] 164

References

  1. ↑ Huey, Steve. "The Land of Rape and Honey - Ministry". AllMusic. Retrieved March 20, 2010.
  2. ↑ Christgau, Robert. "CG: Ministry". robertchristgau.com, Retrieved on March 20, 2010.
  3. ↑ Brackett, Nathan. "Ministry". The New Rolling Stone Album Guide. November 2004, pg. 544. Cited March 20, 2010
  4. ↑ http://www.allmusic.com/album/the-land-of-rape-and-honey-mw0000198244
  5. ↑ Wolanski, Coreen (2006-06-02). "Ministry - Nothing Exceeds Like Excess • Timeline •". Exclaim!. Retrieved 2012-02-27.
  6. ↑ "Tisdale, Saskatchewan". Find Target. Retrieved June 8, 2010.
  7. ↑ Terich, Jeff. "10 Ambiguous Album Covers". Treblezine. Retrieved 7 June 2016.
  8. ↑ Jourgensen, Al; Wiederhorn, Jon (2013). Ministry: The Lost Gospels According To Al Jourgensen. Da Capo Press. p. 86.
  9. ↑ "RIAA certifications". Recording Industry Association of America.
  10. ↑ Acharya, Kiran. "Revolting Lots: Al Jourgensen's Favourite Ministry Albums". The Quietus. Retrieved 7 June 2016.
  11. ↑ Chillingworth, Alec. "Every Ministry album, ranked from worst to best". TeamRock. Retrieved 19 August 2016.
  12. ↑ "The Land of Rape and Honey - Ministry". Billboard.
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