bob.

my first thought was...this is impossible....both of these bands are the basic foundation for everything i like in music...and in many ways my philosophy towards life....both mean so much to me

but after much heavy thought

Skinny Puppy - 2
Ministry - 0

i'll explain

on my ipod right now
skinny puppy - 67
ministry - 30

although the album "Mind Is A Terrible Thing To Taste" would easily land within my top three albums of all time....i really don't listen to anything after Psalm 69

guess who was a "member" of Ministry on Mind Is A Terrible Thing To Taste?

skinny puppy has never covered a Ministry song.....the b side to Burning Inside is Smothered Hope

i first saw Ministry in 1990 and it literally changed my life....Ogre was a member at that time

first time i saw Skinny puppy in 1993.....my mind was completely blown

my two favorite Pigface songs are Suck (welcome to Mexico *******) and Asphole....Ogre does vocals on both

Ministry introduced me to Thelema and Skinny Puppy introduced me to The Process

i have watched Ain't It Dead yet at least five time while under the influence of LSD



hmmm.....still impossible

__________________
A kiss is the beginning of cannibalism.

Reach out, pierce the fine fabric of the sheltering sky, take repose.

Engine

I can't offer as much factual/personal analysis as bob. Except that Al Jourgensen and Paul Barker were also in Lard, which I like. My gut reaction is to go for Skinny Puppy because they seem more important. But deeper introspection tells me that I must vote for Ministry. It feels wrong but I like them more.

Skinny Puppy: 2
Ministry: 1

__________________

Like an arrow,
I was only passing through.

Screen13

Although I like some Ministry from time to time, Skinny Puppy gets my vote - More interesting.

As for immediate effect, Mid-Late 80's Ministry had the edge (and I even like several of the off shoots as well), though. I accidentally knew where Ministry got the Crowley quote for the title of their great Psalm 69 album after getting my first book of his original writings, and you could imagine that explosion in the brain after that. That was pretty much the effect I got after finding out where David Tibet got the name Current 93 from right around the same time. The words "Stumbled Upon" just does not do that discovery justice.

I liked Rev Co (especially as David F. Friedman, Exploitation Producer of the 60's and 70's wound up in the video to "Do You Think I'm Sexy" as the bartender!) and loved Lard.

As for Skinny Puppy, there's a little more to get into and find out. Being a kid in small dot, I never knew what Vivisection was until I found out about what they were talking about, and that was the opening of a mind right there and then. With bob's Process/Skinny Puppy mention in mind, I think that there was another explosion in my mind when this reader of Apocalypse Culture (2'nd edition...wish I caught onto the first when a friend got the Amok catalog!) knew that my mind exploded once again when Skinny Puppy's Process album was released. I don't think that I even made connections when I was occasionally listening to Psychic TV (I did not have the first album until the Mid 90's CD release).

I think that as for a Puppy-related project, the Tear Garden may have had the most effect on me. I was driving my car home for about 30 Miles and Brave New Waves was playing "You and Me and Rainbows" - in the middle of the night - about 1AM - alone. An experience!

Engine

Add it up, yo

Skinny Puppy: 3
Ministry: 1

__________________

Like an arrow,
I was only passing through.

William_the_Bloody

If you can add it up it would be appreciated, I know a lot of people coming in are probably not aware of the tallying, I remember getting called out on it when I first started.

Also please don't feel obligated to write about your choice if you can't think of anything, I enjoy reading everyone's rationals, but I don't want a new person not voting because they feel they can't offer up something.

The vote is all I need!!! that being said, if you want to write a written paragraph go for it!

All right, just waiting on one person thinking on their vote, and then we'll move into something more folksy.

Skinny Puppy: 3
Ministry : 1

Screen13

Sorry about that. I normally add it up, but my brain slipped on that little detail when getting involved with the writing.

Skinny Puppy 3
Ministry 1 (Although I voted Skinny Puppy, there has to be more Ministry votes out there, seriously!)

Screen13

Saw Killing Joke on their Extremities tour and found them in excellent forum. Intense! I also had (still have, but only now through Internet connection...moved) a friend who got me into Killing Joke. It was interesting that he had The Courtauld Talks which was far more interesting than the album it was talking about (Outside the Gate), but I was possibly the most sold on that album alone. I once had the Fire Dances/Ha! double play cassette which was a very enjoyable car tape, although the best things is that the vinyl I bought then I still have now.

Never caught the Sisters, although I would have took a time machine and went back to the start of it all instead. I like, but not really love, the Floodland/Vision Thing era. For some reason, I never really caught on to them although I seriously liked the early singles and heard their music to be quite enjoyable.

As the vote's closed on that battle, there's no need to place numbers, but I would have upped the KJ number to 4 if I would have joined that in progress.

Screen13

To me, both had a lot of influence from the Garage Punk era and there's a serious compare and contrast - The Stranglers had a lot of ideas but by the Early 80's sometimes got very caught up in trying to be something more, scoring with a few great songs that gave their direction a support but came up with quite a few disappointing efforts that sapped the energy out of them and then turned out to be a very bland band by the Late 80's with obvious career saving covers just to keep a sagging career alive. I have not heard a lot of post-90 stuff, but maybe that's for the better. Still there's quite a few classic songs and a couple of essential albums plus one WTF moment that all fans have to hear once.

The Damned, on the other hand, just went with their instincts and wound up a band that sounded sharp at their best and at least trying to crank up some enjoyment at their least - they worked best with a wild energy. The only eras I seem to have some criticism for was the Anything era where it went into 80's over-production and the Early-Mid 90's when things were looking very uncertain, but that's very minimal when weighing things out between those bleak era and everything else (I try to avoid the Captain's brief solo moment in the UK Top 50 sun and file it under "It was The 80's and he had a lucky break that did not last long" although there were a couple of tasty but not essential songs in that set). Even a number of their offshoot projects were fun, and I liked the Naz Nomad album as well as The Phantom Chords (Dave's MCA era solo project).

True, this is bring up some closed battles, but I felt like remarking on them...anyways, The Damned won, and (as the Captain once said on Strawberries) life goes on.