If I am to name five artists who inspire my music creation journey, that would be Tori Amos, Pink Floyd, PJ Harvey, Prince, and Marilyn Manson in no particular order. That explains the length of this blog and I challenge you to devour every word I wrote – the finest piece of review I have to date perhaps.
Fans fall in love with Marilyn Manson’s unique dark music, his wit offstage, and his satirical views on government and religion. This unique blend of attributes gives forth an artist that there is none other than Marilyn Manson himself. Arduous fans support him to death while religious groups and government spokespersons protest against his artistic works records after records. It is not hard to imagine when he shamelessly voices out his religious opinions taking on the symbol of an Antichrist. His state opinions were being blamed for triggering the Columbine High School massacre just because the shooter was listening to Marilyn Manson during the shooting. As interviewed in Michael Moore’s controversial documentary “Bowling for Columbine”, Marilyn Manson argued that part of the American culture is to trigger fear and to find a common scapegoat. In this case, an entertainer is being picked while Bush was dropping bombs at Afghanistan causing more casualty than Columbine massacre. His views on government, fear, consumerism, and the American culture of guilt hiding and the use of violence as a mean to an end that is dated back in World World II – can be intriguingly intelligent.
Marilyn Manson is a stage name derived from Marilyn Monroe and Charles Manson representing the two extremes of the spectrum in the American history. His music style is hauntingly dark and each album of his takes on a cohesive theme. With the talented Trent Reznor (who later formed Nine Inch Nail) collaborating with Marilyn Manson for that one record, “Antichrist Superstar” is perhaps his most notable work to date. And with “Antichrist Superstar” spins a trilogy of two more records “Mechanical Animals” and “Holy Wood”. His subsequent record “The Golden Age of Grotesque” was inspired by the seamy underside of Weimar Berlin specifically the underground artists back in 1930’s in the pre-Nazi Germany era. For those who are new to Marilyn Manson, I would recommend either the more accessible “Mechanical Animals” or the more tuneful “The Golden Age of Grotesque”. I will get to his latest work “Eat Me, Drink Me” in just a minute. If you are not too fussy on the lack of final polishing on the record production and if you usually listen to rock music but not nu-metal, “Eat Me, Drink Me” may be a better choice for you as his other records can get a bit “noisy”.
Marilyn Manson does not seem to have problem in attracting talents in assembling his band lineup even though some left or were fired along the way. John5 joined as the live guitarist for “Mechanical Animals” and was officially part of the band until lately. Twiggy Ramirez, an old time bassist and guitarist who contributed much to the music of the band, was ousted from the band after the “Holy Wood” album due to creativity differences. For “The Golden Age of Grotesque”, producer and bassist Skold was introduced into the band and have become a major source of music writing together with lead guitarist John5 who stepped up after the departure of Twiggy Ramirez. Probably due to difference in lifestyle, John5 – the only member with a clean image – left (or was fired from) the band after “The Golden Age of Grotesque”. There are fans who miss Twiggy’s guitar playing and there are even more fans who miss John5. In any case, Skold is now the new lead guitarist of Marilyn Mason with a new bassist coming on board from Prodigy to replace his previous role in the band.
While stifled by the circumstances of marriage with Dita Von Teese (once made it to the cover of Playboy magazine), Marilyn Manson withdrew from the music creation scene for a couple of years until he met his new 19 years old girlfriend Evan Rachel Wood. All of a sudden, instead of writing songs based on his opinions in the expense of shutting everyone around him, he started to write songs singing for someone. It comes as no surprise that “Eat Me, Drink Me” is inspired by his recent divorce and his new found love. Theme-wise, it is still as dark as before, more towards depression. However because the songs are more personal, he sings with emotions that can easily come across from the final recording. Music-wise, “Eat Me, Drink Me” was recorded in his own home studio with his buddy Skold and together, they played all the tracks from lead to bass guitar to drum programming to vocals. Bassist Skold has proven to be an all rounded producer and musician. “Personal Jesus”, a remake of one of Depeche Mode’s songs that was featured in his greatest hits album “Lest We Forget”, was created entirely by Skold with Marilyn Manson only contributed on the vocal track. Due to all these circumstances, “Eat Me, Drink Me” is heavy on the guitar and vocals and Marilyn Manson’s music continues to be tuneful like “The Golden Age of Grotesque”. One may observe that “Eat Me, Drink Me” is less produced and as close to unplugged as you can get with Marilyn Manson.
So, has our Antichrist Superstar turned human with songs that are sung with his heart and not opinions that humor the systems in the satirical way? Lyrics-wise, “Eat Me, Drink Me” explores the concept of “devouring someone whom you love dearly” or for that matter, “getting devoured by the one you love most”. In his own words (and definitely not mine), like Christ whose body and blood is consumed by the Christian community, Marilyn Manson is turning himself into a symbol to be … devoured. Intriguing concept I know but Marilyn Manson being the shock rocker himself, no topic is a taboo.
Is this change of his music direction for good? According to him, although he does not regret songs in the past that were written based on his opinions, he wish to have spent more time writing songs for the audience – even if it is for that one person. Besides music creation, Marilyn Manson does lots of watercolor painting having his own art exhibitions. He has a new upcoming film of which he is playing the director role.
With all that said, I think Marilyn Manson is a very talented artist if people can look beyond the way he sings, the way he looks, and the music themes that are less than mainstream.
I do not intend to embed the new promotional video clip “Heart-Shaped Glasses” again in this blog. You can view it in my previous blog. Now that I have listened to the entire album, in that video clip, the beginning instrumental track (with Marilyn Manson and Evan Rachel Wood having simulated sex) comes from the song “Evidence”. And inside the car when Evan was asking Marilyn Manson to drive “faster, faster … faster, faster, faster”, that is from the song “Are You Rabbit?”. The artwork of him and Evan holding out a knife while taking pictures with a Polaroid and the final car crash scene, those are from the song “Just A Car Crash Away”. Lyrically, tell me if I have a warped mind or not, I think this song no doubt is for his new girlfriend. But I think it is partially inspired by his science experiments when he had to dissect something (I have personally dissected a frog once in my life).
The chorus of “Heart-Shaped Glasses” goes something like “Don’t break, don’t break my heart and I won’t break your heart-shaped glasses. Little girl, little girl, you should close your eyes, that blue is getting me high, making me low”, which sounds kind of normal. But for the rest of the song “She reminds me of the one in school when I was cutting … and she’ll never cover up what we did with a dress … And I don’t mind you keeping me on pins and needles. If I could stick to you and you could stick me too.” – those words got me thinking especially when this album is about devouring someone you love. Maybe I am warped, maybe I am used to Marilyn Manson’s music … either way, I am one of his zealous fans.
PS. I wrote this blog without Wikipedia. The page on Marilyn Manson is down. It is hard! Thank you YouTube for all the interview videos and all the wonderful materials in the Internet especially MarilynManson.com that contains lots of interviews from various reputed magazines. And of course, I have been following Marilyn Manson’s career for a long time. I can even recite his progress backward.
PPS. Cynthia is looking for a pair of heart-shaped glasses right now. What’s the odd of a guy gets to live with someone who loves to listen to Marilyn Manson as well? Priceless.