Author: Aleš Podbrežnik
Artist: Marilyn Manson
Label: Caroline International S&D
Release: 2017
Running time: 47:32
Rating: 4/5
Marilyn Manson is quickly back on the scene with a new album, his tenth. “Heaven turned upside down.” That’s it. Welcome to hell, folks! After the somewhat calmer, even more intimate, emotionally loaded detour that was »The Pale Emperor«, its successor – which was supposed to drop back in early February of this year and got its first taste last year with the single Say10 (originally the working title of the new album) – is in a way a herald of the realization that Marilyn Manson’s musical evolution has come full circle. »Heaven Upside Down« brings back the guitar sound of corrosive bristling typical of the earlier part of his career, and with it Manson, to a degree, revives the character of the albums »Mechanical Animals« and »Antichrist Superstar«, or even resurrects them in a way. In short: sometimes you obviously have to take two steps back to make three steps forward easier.
Once again, we get bristling guitars screeching all over the place, industrial rhythms and howling, repetitive programmed loops. Manson is in his typical state of expression, “dressed” as a rule in that eternally distorted effect as he sets about singing his freshly written lyrics, full of scandalousness. He remains a demon of his own kind! Or at least he’s trying to, because this time his shock factor doesn’t land the way it did in the nineties, even though he pulls out some of the old tricks again. The bass lines are less audible in the mix this time; compare the sound of this album with its predecessor and what really steps up front is a production reminiscent of late-nineties Manson, which first comes to the fore in We Know Where You Fucking Live, where the guitars sound like a choir of circular saws and the basses are distinctly thinned out. The material on the new album has a nice amount of variety, moments of gothic gloom, rounded off by the longest track, Saturnalia, and a hefty, jagged groove in a track like Tattooed in Reverse. Tracks like Say10 and Je$u$ Cri$i$ bring out the chemistry between Tyler Bates and Manson in the best possible way, and through their expressionist reach you can sense the energy of Cupid Carries A Gun from Bates’s TV series Salem, even though Say10 and Je$u$ Cri$i$ sound strictly Manson-esque, a lot more uncompromising and bristling, with far less melody. Kill4Me is a cunning artistic translation of Manson’s musical vision into pop music, really a collision of the two. One of the catchier cuts, which makes sense if it’s leaning toward pop. Backed by raw rhythms that are easy to clap along to. This track is later matched, energy-wise, by the title track, which in artistic terms is one of the best achievements of the new album. The closing Threats Of Romance is a nifty collision of Manson’s industrial theater, the distorted grimacing of his vocals, cabaret music and even blues! A track that stands apart from the rest of the material and a fitting choice for a “teasing” end to the album.
What Manson pulled off really well on this album is that he put together a very compact record. The tracks are sequenced in such an order that they basically open the doors for each other. When one ends, its energy and atmosphere practically scream for the next one to spin. And in setting the track order, Manson proved himself an incredibly deft juggler. It’s actually an album that grows on you over time, even though it’s typical bizarrely minimalist artistry, as Manson’s musical vision understands it. If in Je$u$ Cri$i$ Manson is almost annoying with his repetition, insisting that even in his midlife crisis he remains the ever-trustworthy God of Fuck, the sensitive and fragile Blood Honey right after it shows the artist’s vulnerable side. A proper atmospheric contrast! And there’s a heap of those on the album. In that sense, Manson has excellently “glued” the new album together.
Actually, Manson’s persona, embodying that famous monster that feeds on all the fears of the single-minded heads of mass conformism, shocks more this time by retreating to tried-and-tested musical moves from the past, reviving and dragging out of the archives an “outdated” kind of production that stopped being relevant a long time ago. That way Manson becomes more a parody of himself than a parody of all the absurdities and idiocy of life in the post-democracy of the new age.
It would be too early to conclude that Manson has fallen into a creative crisis; rather, the new album delivers the insight that this time Manson is “shielding” and “guarding” his artistic trenches, or enjoying the fruits of his creative achievements and gains from the past. A thoroughly solid piece of work. The guy isn’t opening up any new creative horizons, but he stays as obscene as ever, i.e. “culturally shocking”.
Marilyn Manson – We Know Where You Fucking Live (official video):
Lineup
Marilyn Manson – vocals
Tyler Bates – all instruments except drums, programming
Gil Sharone – drums
GUEST MUSICIANS:
Dana Dentata – backing vocals on track no. 8
Roger Joseph Manning Jr. – clavinet on track no. 10
Production
Tyler Bates
Tracklist
01. Revelation #12
02. Tattooed In Reverse
03. We Know Where You Fucking Live
04. Say10
05. Kill4me
06. Saturnalia
07. Je$u$ Cri$i$
08. Blood Honey
09. Heaven Upside Down
10. Threats Of Romance
