Show Review: Ministry + My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult at The Warfield, 6/3/25

The industrial ‘90s buzz was still humming through my nervous system as I stepped into The Warfield on June 3rd. I was still lit from the Lords of Acid show at DNA Lounge just days prior, neon sweat, latex steam, and raunchy beats still echoing somewhere deep in my spine.

I arrived just in time, minutes before My Life with the Thrill Kill Kult took the stage. Groovie Mann and I have shared several weird and hilarious timelines together over the years. I’ve seen them perform in a wedding tent at the Folsom Street Fair, in a seedy little club in San Jose, at an underground warehouse in Los Angeles where you could practically touch the ceiling and maybe catch tetanus from it. This time, the contrast was immediate. The Warfield’s stage towered above us with a photo barrier in place. Groovie and the gang were at least 8 to 10 feet up, like glam ghouls on a rock altar.

Normally, I’ve been so close I could feel the fan blowing the skull-on-a-chain swinging above their heads. So close I could smell deodorant (or its absence), so close it felt like one more step would land you onstage, or in trouble. This time, I adapted.

[Show picture list]

Their set was tight. A lean, 45-minute burst of their best-known hits. It felt more like a classic rock show than the sleazy underground carnival I associate them with, but it worked. It rocked. They brought the heat with “Sex on Wheelz,” “Days of Swine and Roses,” and a few other filthy gems. The sound was clean, but not sterile. The crowd was locked in, vibing. And of course, the show stirred up a fever dream memory: me, backstage in San Jose, microdosing MDA and fag-hagging for a friend at the time who was drunkenly offering Groovie Mann “a blowjob you will never forget for the rest of your life.” Groovie didn’t say no, but after a flushed moment of consideration, and maybe a little tongue, he turned beet red, and we knew it was time to exit stage left. LOL.

After a brief turnover, the venue plunged into darkness, and Ministry exploded onto the stage. Al Jourgensen emerged in a Jamiroquai-style fuzzy black hat, stomping around like a post-apocalyptic ringmaster with dreadlocks and menace. He was whipping around the mic, feeding off the crowd, and steering his band like a well-oiled machine.

The set focused heavily on their early synth-pop catalog, a surprise to some, a gift to others. “Effigy,” “Over the Shoulder,” and the goth club anthem “(Everyday Is) Halloween” all made appearances. They even dusted off “Ricky’s Hand” by Fad Gadget. The band was razor-sharp: Monte Pittman and Cesar Soto on guitars, Paul D’Amour (yes, from Tool!) on bass, Pepe Clarke Magaña hammering the drums, and John Bechdel on keys. It was tight. Loud. Relentless.

As Ministry’s set reverberated through my bones, another memory hit me square in the chest. I was 12 or 13 the last time I saw Ministry. It was at Neil Young’s Bridge School Benefit in the early ’90s, the acoustic charity event where my mom used to drop me off, which raised money for kids with disabilities. I still remember Tom Petty, Mazzy Star, and the soft rasp of Hope Sandoval; she must’ve been barely 20 at the time. That year, Ministry showed up and, out of nowhere, played a haunting acoustic version of Bob Dylan’s “Lay Lady Lay.” Hearing their music full-blown and electric again, three decades later, I felt like a time traveler. Like someone who’d slipped into a wormhole of noise and nostalgia.

I’m 45 now. And if the last time I saw them I was a kid just discovering Bob Dylan, tonight I was an adult re-baptized in the church of industrial sludge and sequencer sex.