Pigface 35th Anniversary Show

I’ve had a few careers, I guess.

You could call PiL and Killing Joke, from 1979 to 1991, a decent first chapter—and DAMN, I’m proud of that work.

But another path, with several different avenues, began during my brief but important time with Ministry. That tour was a watershed moment and the cementing of the industrial genre I think,  pulling me out of ’80s post-punk and sending me headfirst down the slippery concrete stairs into industrial.

I didn’t really know what it was, but I knew I liked it. It excited me and frightened me a bit. It was fast, there were those drugs I’d already seen destroy other people, but I knew, like others, I needed to be in Chicago.

Jaz and Geordie introduced me to Al at a Killing Joke gig in Chicago , and then Al asked me to tour in 1990.

It was in the middle of that landmark In Case You Didn’t Feel Like Showing Up tour, Bill Rieflin and I started Pigface. Somewhere, there’s a cassette from Florida where we began making beats during a soundcheck.

The DAY the tour ended, we went into Chicago Trax Studio on Halsted on a spec deal, knowing we couldn’t pay for the studio, let alone the flights to bring Ogre, Esch and everyone else back to Chicago.

I still have that deal memo at the museum. Thank you, Reid Hyams.

We made a risky-as-fuck experimental album. I insisted on flying in my friend Trent to sing on a track that became “Suck.” Esch sang about jumping out of a third-floor window. Albini revelled in the experimentation—he encouraged it, captured it and helped create it.

Yow? Connelly? Barker? Schultz? Ogre?

What label wouldn’t want this?

Well, it turned out, no one.

NO ONE.

I slightly couldn’t believe it.

I think because of the Albini/Yow connection, Corey Rusk at Touch and Go agreed to meet with me. Except he sat me down to tell me he didn’t want to release it either.

Then he suggested that Touch and Go could manufacture and distribute it on my label, Invisible. I didn’t think he was serious. I was worried Bill would think I hadn’t tried hard enough to get us a “real” deal.

But we did it.

The album did well. We blew all the money touring with far too many people, but that was really the beginning of the label I’d started in 1988.

Gub was INV009.

We did something special there. We asked a question:

What if we said FUCK IT and made something more experimental than strategic?

What could we do with the platform we already had?

How much could we risk?

It was a wonderful experiment in trust, risk, friendship, community building and love.

Lots of love.

Pigface GUB is 35 this year. Thank you.

At the end of November, the experiment continues.

We’re putting together a package that makes the show pretty much free for someone who already wants a shirt and something from the merch booth. Rehearsals and a secret dress rehearsal are part of it too, and perhaps a visit to the museum.

MA

Chicago ILLANNOYS