Published on Feb 19, 2000
We’ve all heard the criticisms before. Marilyn Manson is the
devil. His music is corrupting the youth of America. People have
even dared to blame his music for helping to inspire the tragedy in
Littleton, Colorado. Let the truth be known: Marilyn Manson is a
showman who just happens to know how to push people’s
buttons. He’s Alice Cooper for Generation X. ‘Nuff said.
Back in 1994, Manson seemed like he wanted to be the next Trent
Reznor. His debut album,
Portrait Of An American Family, not only was released on
Reznor’s Nothing label, but Reznor himself executive produced the
effort. In the end, though, Manson can’t seem to get things to come
together solidly, and the effort sounds like watered-down Nine Inch
Nails.
It doesn’t start out badly for the former Brian Warner. After a
spoken-word intro that is intermixed with just enough audio
weirdness, Manson and band kick things off with the first song that
would win them infamy – “Cake And Sodomy”. Right off the bat,
Manson sounds more like an alternative industrial artist than
anything else (I’ve seen Manson’s work classified as “heavy metal”
– I don’t think so), and while the parents’ groups and religious
right will always have a field day with the content of this song,
it really isn’t a bad effort musically. You don’t have to agree
with every word in a song to appreciate the songwriting.
Too bad there aren’t more moments like this on
Portrait Of An American Family, though I can point out a few
others. “Get Your Gunn,” a song that was called to people’s
attention after the Columbine shootings, is another decent effort
that puts together the angst that Manson’s generation feels with a
driving quasi-industrial beat. Likewise, the two songs that close
this album, “My Monkey” and “Misery Machine,” are solid efforts
that show the promise Manson had as a young artist.
Unfortunately, the bulk of
Portrait Of An American Family collapses under its own
weight of grandiose dreams and shock-rock tactics. It’s not that I
object to any of the imagery or language used in the course of the
album. Instead, it’s that the songwriting and performances on
tracks like “Cyclops,” “Dogma” and “Dope Hat” seem rather
uninspired, and that Manson is hardly using his anger and ability
to leave listeners wide-eyed to his full potential. Granted, this
is only Manson’s first album – but I’d expect a new artist to be a
lot hungrier than the one I hear on this disc.
Is this a bad disc? I wouldn’t quite go that far. It is an
intriguing listen if all you know about Manson are songs like “The
Beautiful People” from
Antichrist Superstar, though it might leave you scratching
your head a bit. But it’s hardly up to par with what I think Manson
was capable of doing.
Portrait Of An American Family is not a bad picture, but is
hardly the one that Manson would want to hang in his house as the
first thing people saw.