Skatenigs

The Skatenigs began their career as associates of Ministry and its stable of guest musicians during the late '80s. Singer Phil Owens appeared on the Revolting Cocks' Beers, Steers and Queers album, and managed to get the Skatenigs a spot on the Revolting Cocks/Mentors tour. After the drug-fueled decadence of that experience, the band recorded the Chemical Imbalance EP and shopped for a label. Megaforce Records came knocking, so the band signed on to release their debut, Stupid People Shouldn't Breed. Ministry mastermind Al Jourgensen produced the album, but refused to take credit for it, beginning a rift between himself and Owens. The music was a catchy mix of punk, metal, and industrial, but it never really caught on and soon they found themselves off of Megaforce. By 1994, tensions were quite high between Owens and Jourgensen, but the band managed to release What a Mangled Web We Leave on Red Force and toured behind it. The band remained rather inactive during the second half of the decade, reappearing in 2000 with a different lineup. Ministry wrote a song about all the bad blood between the group of musicians who used to gravitate around Jourgensen, and many believe that Owens was one of the song's major targets. Owens denied this claim, instead trying to focus any attention he received on the new Skatenigs album, which still has not arrived.