Student blogger Rhiannon-Skye Boden reviews the industrial rock singer’s latest album!
Marilyn Manson – The Pale Emperor
The Pale Emperor has been a long time coming for Marilyn Manson, but worth the wait. In some ways the album is a culmination of everything the shock-rocker stands for, unapologetic and clever, but this time things are different.
This is a new kind of Manson record, more streamlined than before, proving that an old dog can both learn and teach new tricks.
Though there are metal elements in songs like Deep Six that genre is mostly gone, replaced with hooks that would be as fitting in a Film Noir as they would be at Download. There’s a new sense of maturity too, Cupid Carries A Gun has an uncharacteristic amount of pop appeal and Birds Of Hell Are Waiting takes Manson’s most iconic riff to a whole new place.
While it lacks the in your face confrontation of his early years, this album is subtler but no less commanding. It’s comprised of sprawling blues and sludgy guitars, capturing the darkness and decadence of life as America’s most controversial rock star. In one sense at least it’s a quintessential Marilyn Manson record – nobody could have predicted it.
