Al Jourgensen

Alain David Jourgensen (born Alejandro Ramírez Casas; October 9, 1958) is a Cuban-American singer, musician and music producer.

Closely related with the independent record label Wax Trax! Records, his musical career spans four decades.

Alejandro Ramírez Casas was born in Havana, Cuba, on October 9, 1958, the son of Margarita "Maggie" Brouwer (born c. 1942) and Gualberto Ramírez Casas (born c. 1936), and the grandson of Julio Brouwer, a biologist.

Jourgensen's extended family has Dutch and Spanish heritage.

Born in Havana shortly before the Cuban Revolution of 1959, at the age of three Jourgensen moved to the United States with his family, and was raised mainly in Chicago and Breckenridge, Colorado.

He developed an interest in music at a young age, and was involved in several short-lived bands, as well as briefly performing in the backing band of drag performer Divine.

In 1961, following the fall of Fulgencio Batista's regime and rise of Fidel Castro to power, his family relocated to the US.

In 1964, Brouwer married Ed Jourgensen, a stock car driver and mechanic for Formula One driver Dan Gurney.

She adopted his surname for herself and her son.

Jourgensen was raised in Chicago, Illinois and in Breckenridge, Colorado.

He graduated from Summit County High School in Frisco, Colorado, in 1976.

He was a fan of a wide range of artists including the Beatles, Pink Floyd, Hawkwind, Led Zeppelin, Hank Williams and George Jones.

Seeing the Ramones on stage in Denver was the night that Jourgensen decided to be a punk musician.

Jourgensen eventually attended the University of Illinois Chicago, after briefly enrolling at both the University of Northern Colorado and the University of Colorado.

His subsequent releases in the 1980s, most prominently Ministry's The Land of Rape and Honey (1988) and The Mind Is a Terrible Thing to Taste (1989), showcased his stylistic transition; in the early 1990s, he achieved mainstream success with Ministry's fifth studio album, Psalm 69: The Way to Succeed and the Way to Suck Eggs (1992).

He is the frontman and lyricist of the industrial metal band Ministry, which he founded in 1981 and of which he remains the only constant member.

He was the primary musician of several Ministry-related projects, such as Revolting Cocks, Lard, and Buck Satan and the 666 Shooters.

Jourgensen is a prominent figure in industrial music, influencing numerous other groups and musicians, both in alternative and industrial-associated acts.

Jourgensen formed Ministry in 1981 in Chicago and received significant attention from music press regarding the band's 1983 debut studio album, With Sympathy.

Jourgensen formed Ministry in 1981 after leaving Special Affect, a new wave/synth-pop band (notably including Frankie Nardiello, founding member (as Groovie Mann) of My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult and drummer Harry Rushakoff of Concrete Blonde).

Early singles by Ministry and Jourgensen's other projects were released on Wax Trax! Records.

He also produced Skinny Puppy's Rabies album.

During that time, Jourgensen befriended Nivek Ogre, who later toured with Ministry.

The band broke into the mainstream with 1992's Psalm 69: The Way to Succeed and the Way to Suck Eggs album.

Its opening track, "N.W.O.", was nominated for a 1993 Grammy Award for Best Metal Performance, losing to Nine Inch Nails' "Wish".

However, its next album, Filth Pig (1996), divided their fan base, leading to a commercial decline that became evident when Warner Bros. Records dropped them from the label in 2001.

The next few years were marked by publicity surrounding Jourgensen's substance abuse which negatively affected his creative output and resulted in a period of severe depression; during this time, Jourgensen and Ministry appeared in the 2001 Steven Spielberg film A.I. Artificial Intelligence.

In 2005, Jourgensen established his own record label, 13th Planet Records, through which several Ministry records, among others, were released until the early 2010s.

Currently Jourgensen and Ministry are signed to Nuclear Blast Records

Ministry's next albums, Rio Grande Blood (2006) and The Last Sucker (2007), as well as the 2006 Revolting Cocks album Cocked and Loaded, were released on Jourgensen's new record label, 13th Planet Records, which he formed after falling out with the mainstream agendas of major industry labels.

At the specific request of director Stanley Kubrick, Jourgensen appeared with Ministry in the film A.I.: Artificial Intelligence.

He related his conversation with Kubrick in an interview:

"Well, first of all, I hung up on him. I thought it was a crank call. His secretary was calling and I was like, 'Yeah, right.' Click. And then he called back personally and then talked to me, and I was just freaked out. I mean, who wouldn't be freaked out? Here's this eccentric American God living in the countryside of England, and he's calling me up in Austin, Texas, and saying he wants me to do the music for his film and he wants me to be in his film and he's famous and all that. I didn't even believe it."

Ministry continued its involvement with the film project after Kubrick's death, and Jourgensen revealed that after initial tension with Steven Spielberg, partly due to Jourgensen's prank when he claimed being told that "A.I."

stood for "Anal Intruder" and threatening to walk off production because it was not a porn film, he and Spielberg enjoyed a friendly relationship, with two compositions appearing on the soundtrack: "What About Us" and "Dead Practice".

A number of his songs also appear in other films, such as Wicked Lake (2008)—produced by Fever Dreams and ZP Studios—for which he composed the entire soundtrack that was released on his own 13th Planet record label—he also makes a small appearance in the film as an art school teacher.

In a November 2008 issue of Hustler Magazine, Jourgensen announced that Ministry was officially finished, as the band "[took] up so much time" and releasing new albums was difficult.

He also explained that he was responsible for six other bands and could complete seven albums within a year when he was not working on new Ministry material.

However, despite Jourgensen's insistence that Ministry would never return, a reunion was announced on August 7, 2011.

A new album, entitled Relapse, was released on March 26, 2012.