Re: [新聞] Manson featured in KERRANG
記者把 Manson 的情況寫得好慘。
不過,從 Manson 說的話看來,似乎也不是那麼糟糕;
的確他幾個月前曾經陷入低潮,但是他可以面對。在下認為。
TWILIGHT OF THE GODS?
Earlier this year, the world nearly lost Marilyn Manson. The God Of
Fuck wanted to die. Now he's back, with a hit single, a greatest hits
collection and a brand new hunger for chaos and destruction.
Words: Tom Bryant Phoyos: Scarlet Page
THE LAST six months of Marilyn Manson's life has been the bleakest he
has ever faced.
During that time he decided to give up music for good. He decided
he didn't want to be Marilyn Manson anymore -- that he was sick of
performing onstage and constantly playing up to an audience. He was
afraid that his mental health has been ruined forever.
The lawsuits, the vilification, the hassle was all getting too much.
Worse still was the nagging fear that music just wasn't providing the
same kick anymore. Then he decided to play the role of a child
molester alongside Asia Argento in 'The Heart Is Deceitful Above All
Things', based on the novel by JT Leroy. He pushed himself to the
limit, keeping his role as close to the bone as possible, repeatedly
coming off the set punched, bloodied and beaten.
It led directly to the darkest video of his career -- for the song
'(S)aint'. It was, he says, a completely honest mirror to the world
he was living in, that nothing within it was faked. That video
features the singer snorting coke from a bible, masturbating, vomiting,
slicing himself up and having graphic sex with both men and women.
You're unlikely to see Cat Deeley introducing the video on 'cd:uk' any
time soon.
It affected him so much that current greatest hits album 'Lest We
Forget: The Best Of' was to be his farewell to music. And all the
time he was thinking about suicide, about ending it all because he
couldn't go on. He can't tell you how many times he nearly went
through with it.
ALL THIS is now, apparently, behind him. Today Manson's in the Zeta
Bar, next door to the Park Lane Hilton in London. It's been opened
especially for him. He's enclosed in a screened-off section of the
bar, legs crossed and sitting to attention on a sofa and is not
entirely what you expect.
He's not the same intimidating danger to the world as he's been
portrayed. Instead he's small and nervous. His eyes, coloured by a
vivid contact lens in his left eye and heavy black make-up, shift down
and to the right constantly. Occasionally he looks you in the eye, a
piercing stare. He uses it sparingly but randomly -- not when he's
being particularly forceful, more when he wants to check you out.
First he sends the absinthe he is sipping back to the bar -- it's
too weak -- then he shakes hands and wilts for the questions. His
immaculately made-up eyes give absolutely nothing away except, perhaps,
that he is tired, and wants this to be over.
FOR SOMEONE WHO CLAIMS TO BE SUBVERSIVE AND PROVOCATIVE, A GREATEST
HITS ALBUM SEEMS TO BE A VERY TRADITIONAL MOVE. WHY DO IT? WHY NOW?
"There's a feeling of politics and people in the air at the moment,
the same feeling there was in 1969. That was the year I was born and
it was also the year that everything changed. Nothing has been the
same since 1969. I feel like we're about to have another one of those
times. This greatest hits is a way of putting things to rest and
deciding what I do next musically. I wanted to remind people of
everything I've done and to put all of it in a position where it could
be seen."
IT'S CALLED 'LEST WE FORGET...', ARE YOU WORRIED YOUR STAR IS ON THE
WANE, THAT PEOPLE WILL FORGET YOU?
"It seems impossible at this point for people to forget me. It's not
that I feel I've made my mark, or that I take the attention for
granted, but I don't think you can ignore me yet. The title is more
because of the symbolism. Lest we forget is always associated with
memorials. It commemorates fighting; it commemorates 10 years of
fighting to get where I am.
"I wanted to sum up everything I've done so far. That's the reason
I covered (Depeche Mode's) 'Personal Jesus', it wrapped up everything
in one slice of pop culture. It was first released in the same year I
started the band and recording it now closes one chapter and opens a
new one. It's a farewell to the past. When I took the words Marilyn
and Manson and put them together, I was summing up pop culture in two
words. Now 'Personal Jesus' says something more than anything I could
say myself right now."
THIS IS the way Manson talks. Every question is treated with the
utmost seriousness; it's given a long and intelligent-sounding answer --
even those that are yawningly mundane.
But nothing is ever answered directly. Everything is treated as
theory and it comes in a wave of low-pitiched bluster. The answers
are immediate, rarely does he pause between the end of the answer, but
every question is turned, so a sliver of an answer is given, enough to
keep you interested, before the conversation is brought back to what
Marilyn Manson wants to talk about. And he always has something to
say because he's good at playing the game, good at playing Marilyn
Manson, good at keeping himself hidden. Listen...
YOU DON'T LIKE TO GIVE YOURSELF AWAY. WHY DO YOU NEED TO DISGUISE
YOUR PERSONAL LIFE?
"I try to be as open as I feel I need to be. It's never possible to
insert your entire personality into an interview or a meeting with
somebody. I've always tried to point out the same thing ever since I
started: I'm just like everybody else. The only difference is that
I'm more prepared to show my flaws than most. The flaws are what make
a person. People are surprised by how normal I am, how like everyone
else I am."
THIS SOUNDS like a preposterous comment. Just look at the photos
alongside this feature -- how many of your mates look like that?
It also happens to be true. He's not the intimidating God Of Fuck
in real life; he's sane, rational and a good deal more human than he
appears. His interest in the world, though, comes across not as a
love for life, but as a curiously observed experiment, real life as
distorted through the eye of a lens or the filcker of a television
screen. It's impossible for him to see life any differently, thought --
Marilyn Manson's raison detre has always been to embody, to subver and
to define popular culture. There's a sense that it's all been getting
a bit much for Manson of late, though.
YOU'VE RECENTLY APPEARED IN TWO FILMS, 'PARTY MONSTER' AND 'THE HEART
IS DECEITFUL ABOVE ALL THING'. IS THAT A WAY OF CREATING DIFFERENT
PERSONAE, DIFFERENTS MASKS... POSSIBLY BECAUSE YOU'RE GETTING SICK OF
BEING MARILYN MANSON?
"That's one of the questions I've been asking myself over the last six
months. It's been difficult to come to terms with everything I am.
Six months ago, I wanted to end it all, I wanted to say farewell to
music, to not have anything to do with this anymore.
WHAT CHANGED?
"I had to think very hard about everything I've had the chance to
achieve. I had to force myself not to take those things for granted.
I also had to decide not to tolerate a lot of things. I've never done
things that were against the way I feel -- except going to jail -- but
somethimes you're swayed into doing more than you really want to. At
times that's certainly included performing in front of an audience.
There was a time when I didn't want to go out in gront of an audience
again. It's strange, when I started out I had nothing to lose, but
now I have a lot to lose."
LIKE WHAT?
"I'm about to get married. I have material belongings I don't want to
give up. I have success; I have integrity, sanity and control. I
don't want to give up any of those things."
DO YOU REALLY STILL CARE ABOUT SUCCESS?
"I care about it because it's how you wield power as an artist. I've
earned the platform I can speak from."
SO YOU'RE AFRAID OF LOSING YOUR PLATFORM?
"It's one of the things I've worked to achieve. I have a lot to lose
but now it makes me want to gamble. It makes me more and more
reckless in a strange way. Six months ago I wanted to lose it all, I
didn't care about any of it anymore, so I gambled, I took a chance."
WHAT WAS THE GAMBLE?
"Sticking with it."
FOR MOST of this interview, Manson has been leaning forward listening
intently and answering questions in his slow drawl. He leans back now,
away from the tape recorder, and starts looking into the ceiling. He
masks his face with his glass of absinthe, his head hanging back, his
chin high in the air in contemplation. Or just, perhaps, resignation...
WHY TAKE THE GAMBLE?
"I think it's because I still have a disgust for mankind in general
and more specifically for myself. But I also have hope for both
mankind and myself. For a while I thought I'd achieved most of what I
wanted to achieve, but now I think I have more to create, more to
offer. If I didn't have hope, what would be the point in creating
things? Why would you want to create anything for a world you
ultimately hate? There were times when I wondered whether it was
worth it, though."
HAVE YOU FELT SUICIDAL?
[There's a long pause. Five then 10 seconds pass by. It's the only
moment of silence in the entire interview and it's almost excruciating.
15 seconds... 20 seconds...]
"...Sorry. I was just trying to count how many times I've felt suicidal."
SERIOUSLY?
"[Pause] Yes."
WHY WERE YOU SUICIDAL?
"Maybe it's a feeling of loss of control of your world..."
AND HERE, Manson breaks off; this is clearly not comfortable territory
for him. And so he does what he's used to doing: he diverts the
conversation -- entirely engaginly, his voice almost addictive -- but
it's onto theories and relatives, not real life. Like this...
"Everyone has a different world, there's a different centre to
everyone's universe. I've always tried to maintain a world where
there's not such a line between imagination and waking life. Most
people have everything laid out for them: they go to school, they get
a job, they die. I don't feel there's any reason to follow that, I
want to act more like I did when I was growing up and those things
were unimportant..."
SO HOW DOES THAT RELATE TO SUICIDE?
"When I feel my world is threatened, I want to kill myself. Without
my world, nothing means anything."
SO YOU NEED TO BE IN CONTROL AT ALL TIMES THEN?
"Control is less important than it used to be to me. In the world
I've created, I can let go of control."
BUT, IF IT'S YOUR WORLD, YOU'RE INTRINSICALLY IN CONTROL OF IT. "Yes
sure, but it's controlled chaos... I don't like to think about it too
much... I don't think I'm content yet, though, or at the end of my
cycle... Just because I'm releasing a greatest hits doesn't mean I'm done..."
WITH THAT, Marilyn Manson closes the topic -- more clumsily than
normal -- but there's no more to be said about it today. Part of the
reason for that is because those feelings have been pushed behind him.
The '(S)aint' video was an exorcisism of the monstrous depression he
suffered earlier this year. Music, for now, has returned as his first
love, but making videos and acting are close behind.
He has, he says, no desire to be a film star, but still wants to
act because he feels he needs to create, to push himself further and
further. More tellingly, he also says he likes the feeling of someone
else creating an image for him for a change.
As he stands to leave, shaking on his suit jacket, unfolding his
slender frame, something curious happens. Suddenly it's as if he's
been turned off, any trace of the humanness he's just exhibited
disappears and, once again, he's Marilyn Manson -- weird, asexual,
arrogant and trouble. He barely looks around, standing like a bored
king, waiting to be led to wherever he can relax and do his own thing --
whatever that might be. And it makes you think you've been conned for
the last hour, that the words haven't been coming from anywhere near
his heart or head but from some computer inside him. In seconds he's
become someone else entirely. Then, suddenly, as if reading your mind:
"I went on to www.schizophrenia.com," he says, almost to nobody.
"I looked at the self-diagnosis page and answered yes to every single
question on it. I think I'm schizophrenic."
Then he sweeps from the room, not looking back.
'Lest We Forget: The Best Of Marilyn Manson' is out now on Interscope.
ANTI-CAREERIST SUPERSTAR?
THE RISE AND FALL -- ALMOST
OF MARILYN MANSON
----------------------------------------------------------------------
1989:
Music journalist Brian Warner meets one Scott Mitchell.
They decide to form a band, each adopting the first name of
a famous model and the surname of a serial killer. Marilyn
Manson and Daisy Berkowitz are born. They call their group
The Spooky Kids.
1993:
Nine Inch Nails' Trent Reznor calls, offering them a deal
with his Nothing record label, and support on his NIN tour.
1994:
Touring in the support of debut album 'Portrait Of An
American Family', Manson rips up the 'Book Of Mormon' in
Mormon religious stronghold Salt Lake City. Controversy!
He likes it.
1995:
The Church Of Satan ordains Manson as a Reverend.
1996:
'Antichrist Superstar', produced by Renznor, is a massive
crossover success. Gigs are picketed by angry Christians.
1997:
Manson publishes his autobiography, 'The Long Hard Road Out
Of Hell'. It becomes a bestseller.
1998:
'Mechanical Animals' sees Manson adopting a more glam-
inspired image.
1999:
Teenagers Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold massacre classmates
and teachers at Columbine High School in Denver. Tabloid
newspapers falsely claim Manson's music inspired the killers.
2000:
'Holy Wood (In The Shadow Of The Valley Of Death' re-
established Manson's iconic status.
2001:
Charges of sexual assault are levelled against Manson by a
bald security guard, who accuses him of rubbing his cock
against said bald bonce.
2002:
Charges lowered to misdemeanour. Civil suit thrown out.
Manson won't be going to jail.
2003:
'The Golden Age Of Grotesque' sees Manson as Papa Lazarou.
It tops the Billboard charts.
2004:
Despite a lengthy legal battle between Manson and former
members, a collection of Spooky Kids material slips out.
Our hero is depressed. What he needs is a break.
A greatest hits album, perhaps...
--
you came to see the mobscene i know it isn't your scene
it's better than a sex scene and it's so fucking obscene obscene yeah
You want commitment Put on your best suit, get your arms around me
Now we're going down
down
down
--
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◆ From: 61.229.33.129
※ 編輯: CREgodfather 來自: 61.229.33.129 (11/03 01:05)
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