One Half of a Whole Decade
One Half of a Whole Decade (subtitled Five Years at the Ministry of Sound) is a DJ mix album released by the eponymous record label of house nightclub Ministry of Sound in 1996. As the album's subtitle suggests, the album celebrates and documents the first five years of the Ministry of Sound as a nightclub. It is a box set and contains three discs, the first disc, Rulin', is based around the club's Rulin' garage nights and is mixed by CJ Mackintosh and Todd Terry. The second disc, Frisky?, is based around its Frisky? house nights and is mixed by Seb Fontaine and Jon Pleased Wimmin. The third disc, Logical Progression, is mixed entirely by LTJ Bukem and is based around his Logical Progression drum and bass nights.[1]
One Half of a Whole Decade
2 September 1996
1990–1996
208:40
68:16 (Rulin)
73:00 (Frisky?)
67:24 (Logical Progression)
Clare Gage, Grace Garcia Sutcliffe, Lynn Cosgrave, Mark Rodol, Russell Bradley, Simon Gurney, Steve Canueto
The album's elaborate, unusual packaging, designed by Scott Parker, is a homage of the foil packaging that computer components are sold in, complete with details such as warning details and bar codes. The album was critically acclaimed and was a commercial success, reaching number 9 on the UK Compilation Chart. The album also precedes later anniversary mix albums released by the club such as Fifteen Years and Live & Remastered.
Background[edit]
The Ministry of Sound had opened as a house and garage house-orientated nightclub in Elephant & Castle, London, in September 1991, and quickly developed into a world-renowned nightclub in the ensuing years. According to club biographer, Andy Pemberton, as of mid-1996, the nightclub's "personality" was divided between the Frisky and Rulin' nights at the weekend, which played house and garage music "where the patrons swoon to the latest garage guidance counselors", and the Logical Progression nights mixed by LTJ Bukem, which featured "the hard edged underground throb of drum and bass."[2]
The nightclub celebrated its fifth anniversary in September 1996 in numerous different ways, the most notorious being the projection of their logo onto Buckingham Palace with the message that the Ministry of Sound "lasts longer than a royal marriage," in reference to Prince Charles and Princess Diana's divorce.[3][4] One of the anniversary celebrations was to release an anniversary DJ mix album, One Half of a Whole Decade, to reflect both the five years of the club's history and also its future. Clare Gage, Grace Garcia Sutcliffe, Lynn Cosgrave, Mark Rodol, Russell Bradley, Simon Gurney and Steve Canueto all conceived, produced, marketed and "agonised over" the album.[2] "Jacko" "lovingly mastered" the entire album at Masterpiece Mastering.[2]
Release and reception[edit]
One Half of a Whole Decade was released 2 September 1996 by the Ministry of Sound record label; although the label had released multiple DJ mix albums in different series, it was the label's second standalone DJ mix album.[8] The album was dedicated to former Ministry of Sound DJs David Cole and Larry Levan, with the album booklet saying: "Your spirit lives on."[2] A commercial success, One Half of a Whole Decade reached number 9 on the UK Compilation Chart, and stayed on the chart for six weeks.[8] A critical success, Jason Birchmeier of Allmusic was positive, highlighting Seb Fontaine and LTJ Bukem's mixes as the best due to their "less out of the ordinary" track listings. He noted that although Fontaine's mix "does include some forgettable early-'90s club hits such as Bizarre Inc's 'Raise Me,'" "the then-unknown DJ also lays down some tracks that have become recognized as timeless classics that sound just as good in the early part of the 21st century as they did back in the early '90s."[9]
The album's unusual packaging, designed by the Ministry of Sound's art director Scott Parker, consists of cardboard sleeves stored in a rigid silver box, and is designed to resemble the shiny foil packets in which computer components are sold in, complete with details such as warning labels, futuristic typefaces and technical photographs.[10] Parker explained: "We wanted to link the CD to a clothing idea and decided to pastiche the silver foil packaging for computer parts, complete with the yellow and red warning sticker and bar code. The aim is to look non-designed, that’s why I mixed up the fonts and played with the branding, adding a number of different, futuristic logos."[10]
Parker chose not to vacuum pack the album, as the club's "arch rivals" Cream had already used the method for one of their DJ mix albums, and it "needed to be a sturdier, self-contained package", so the album's box was made by the London Fancy Box Company, and "each of the three CDs has its own sleeve."[10] In order to "make it feel like a piece of technical equipment," Parker used photographs that Tony Stone had taken of a pressing plant, as well as "snapshots of the Ministry building."[10] In 1997, Design Week said the album's packaging was "definitely the best CD design to come out of [Ministry of Sound]," and commented that it "exudes both glamour and a sort of nerdy techno-aesthetic, and is lovely to look at, lovely to hold… on a par with a very expensive box of chocolates."[10]
The Logical Progression disc was later remastered and re-released as the first disc on Bukem's Logical Progression Part 1 compilation in March 2001, released on his label Good Looking Records.[11] For this release, the individual songs were sequenced separately, rather than all on one track.[11] The Ministry of Sound would later release other anniversary compilations for later anniversaries, namely Fifteen Years (2006),[12] Live & Remastered (2011),[13] XX: Twenty Years (2011)[14] and XX: Twenty Years 2 (2012).[15]
Track listing[edit]
Rulin'[edit]
Tracks 1–6 mixed by CJ Mackintosh and tracks 7–12 mixed by Todd Terry