Paul Barker speaks out.

---OK, so its a little long, but Ive always enjoyed reading musician interviews. I found this on Suicidegirls, it reads really fast. It was pretty cool to hear from the quiet one from Minstry for once. These guys are still rockin out!!!---


Ministry
By Daniel Robert Epstein

If Al Jourgensen is the High Priest of Ministry then Paul Barker calls himself the sacrificial lamb. I would disagree because I've seen Ministry in concert and Barker is just as nuts. But Jourgensen supposedly once drank puke. I couldn't see Barker doing that. I think he would rather sit on his porch drinking lemonade but then when a door to door salesman shows up he whips out his shotgun and blows the fucking guy's head off. Anyway I've been reading the boards of SG lately and let me tell you people something, buy Ministry's Animositisomina or I'll blow your fucking head off.Check out Ministry's website.Daniel Robert Epstein: You ready?Paul Barker: Yeah just waiting for some coffee to brew. I'm in beautiful Tampa right now.
DRE:
What made you guys decide to include liner notes for the first time? I thought one of the fun things about Ministry is trying to decipher the lyrics.
PB:
Al [Jourgensen] decided when we were putting it together that he enjoyed the lyrics and why don't we just put them in. I said it wasn't a problem. Its kind of precedent setting for us.
DRE:
Does this mean you guys are going commercial?
PB:
[laughs] That's exactly what it means.
DRE:
I heard you wanted to put lyrics to the music on that last track [Leper].
PB:
What happened was that when we were working on the song. Al was singing along a vocal line I thought was totally badass then he decided he didn't want to do it, so that's I, but I still think it's awesome. [turns away for a minute talking to someone else]
DRE:
What's happening down there?
PB:
Just talking to Al.
DRE:
That's so cool. What made you decide to cover The Light Pours Out Of Me [by Magazine]?
PB:
We used to play that song in 88, 89 as a live song. We love that band and it was an encore song for us. Al had a bootleg of one of our shows which had that on it. The sound quality was so terrible and he wanted to redo it for real so we did.
DRE:
I was reading some stuff about you guys and some fans and even some critics say Ministry was better when you guys were doing drugs. How do you respond to something like that?
PB:
Fuck you [laughs], everybody is a critic. If you don't like what we are doing then do it yourself. What do you say to that? We have lives now. Go listen to Korn. Not Korn, what's the lamest? Linkin Park. Go listen to them.
DRE:
How is it playing the music sober?
PB:
It's hard to be objective about it. It is what it is. This is where we are now that's where we were then. It's important to us to get it together and have fun with it. I suppose in a word it's great. We're different people now than we were five years ago.
DRE:
So you're having more fun now?
PB:
Fuck yeah.
DRE:
Have you and Al fixed the problems you had?
PB:
For the most part.
DRE:
I read that Al says you and he are very different people.
PB:
We're not altogether different.
DRE:
Is the band the major link?
PB:
I suppose so. We're good friends in spite of that. It is a co-creative endeavor.
DRE:
People call Al the high priest. What does that make you?
PB:
[laughs] I don't know, the sacrificial lamb?
DRE:
What was it like being in the Steven Spielberg movie A.I.? A lot of people thought you guys were really selling out until they actually saw the movie.
PB:
Well my impression of the movie was that it was more of a Spielberg movie than a Kubrick film. For the scene we ended up being in we saw some rushes and storyboards. It's all fairly accurate to what Kubrick had in his brain. To me the teddy bear is still a fucking teddy bear.
DRE:
I wanted to see the teddy bear start singing and dancing to pop songs.
PB:
That is basically what it did right? It's cool though. I'm happy that the movie was long, slow, difficult and that lots of people didn't like it. I love that.
DRE:
It's like a lot of your songs.
PB:
Yeah sometimes.
DRE:
What inspired the new album?
PB:
Knowing that we had some music that we had to get out there. It's weird because who knows? Why does anyone do anything creative? In some ways it's just what we do. We feel we still have something to say and that's why we are doing it.
DRE:
How is your live audience different now?
PB:
Well the cool thing is that there are lots of kids in the audience. We're really happy to see that. There are less people in the audience but it's the same type of person.
DRE:
Anymore live albums in the works?
PB:
There was the Sphinctour DVD that came out two years ago. We're doing some recordings here and there.
DRE:
What do you think of your Goth fans?
PB:
Those guys are great. I'm happy that they're coming to see us.
DRE:
Have you ever slept with a Goth girl?
PB:
I suppose years ago. Do Siouxsie and the Banshees fans from 20 years ago count? I don't know if that's pre-Goth. Is Goth a registered trademark?
DRE:
I think we're trying to.
PB:
[laughs] Someone has to.
DRE:
What's pissing you off right now?
PB:
Oh just practical things. Certainly our Commander In Chief and his cronies.
DRE:
What's the last crazy thing you and Al did outside of music?
PB:
I suppose going into Juarez, Mexico, hanging out then getting lost and fearing for our lives. There are some pretty rough parts there. by Daniel Robert Epstein