Pigface was formed from Ministry's The Mind is a Terrible Thing to Taste tour, which produced the In Case You Didn't Feel Like Showing Uplive album and video. For the tour, Al Jourgensen brought Atkins, Nivek Ogre and Chris Connelly. Also on the tour was Rieflin, regular Ministry drummer at the time. While Atkins enjoyed the dynamic of playing with a second drummer, he felt that the lineup was capable of doing much more than being, what he has frequently called, "a Ministry cover band." Once the tour was over, Atkins and Rieflin decided to continue working together and recruited several of their tourmates. Pigface was born with the intention of keeping a revolving-door style collaboration with many experimentally-minded musicians, many of whom, especially early on, had recorded for the influential industrial musicrecord labelWax Trax!. Trent Reznor was also an early partner, before Nine Inch Nails became a household name. "Suck," co-written and sung by Reznor, was something of an underground hit, and Reznor later re-recorded the song for the Broken EP. Rieflin left Pigface after the first tour, leaving Atkins as the sole founder of the group. With hundreds of musical collaborators to record and perform with Pigface, it has ensured that each album, tour, and song is unique. However, this practice has led to some negative criticism due to a perceived lack of continuity. In 2009, Full Effect Records, a Detroit-based label, announced the signing of Pigface. The Pigface album, 6, a collection of songs already recorded over the span of the previous five years, was released soon after the announcement was made. Unlike with the previous releases, there was no tour to support the album. After a seven-year hiatus, Pigface returned for two Chicago performances in November 2016. The first was a rehearsal show held at Reggie's on November 24. On November 25, the band performed at House of Blues: Chicago. Both shows saw the band performing with several first-time members as well as the return of members like Lesley Rankine, En Esch, Mary Byker, Curse Mackey, Dirk Flannigan and Fallon Bowman. Several offshoot bands of Pigface, all smaller sized all-star groups featuring Martin Atkins as a common member, have released albums during the time Pigface was active. These bands include Murder, Inc., The Damage Manual, Ritalin, Martin Atkins And The Chicago Industrial League, Spasm, and The Love Interest. In March 2019, Atkins announced that Pigface would tour again for the first time in fourteen years with thirteen dates scheduled for the East coast and Midwest in November 2019. On February 12, 2020, a larger, national tour was announced to be taking place throughout May, June and July of that year. However, on April 2, 2020, Atkins made the announcement that, as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, the tour had been canceled. Rieflin died on March 24, 2020 from cancer at the age of 59.
Live shows
Pigface concerts are characterized by high-energy performances. It is not unusual to see upwards of ten musicians on stage at any given time during a show. In addition, members of the audience have occasionally been invited on stage during the encore.
Members and collaborators
The following is a partial list of musicians who have contributed to Pigface at some point in the band's history, whether it be appearing live as a band member, performing on an album, or contributing a remix of a Pigface song, along with some of the bands and acts they have been associated with before, during, or after their involvement with Pigface.
