Marilyn Manson was on Reddit last night for an AMA (ask me anything,) here’s some of his more interesting replies:
On who he would like to collaborate with:
“I have some plans to do more work with Shooter Jennings. He and I recorded for his album a cover of David Bowie‘s “Cat People,” and we also wanna do some more music together. I did a couple songs with Johnny Depp recently before he left to go to Australia. And I plan on starting, maybe this week or next week when I’ve got some time, with starting with Twiggy on going back to the core of where Marilyn Manson started. And there’s a strong possibility of doing something with Billy Corgan, while we’re out on the road together. And Jonathan Davis from Korn and I plan on doing something together.”
On if he would ever release an acoustic album:
“I’ve found a bunch of old recordings form when I was making “Holy Wood“, I was rehearsing for the album, and I was doing a bunch of different covers and John Lennon songs and Elton John, just various Johnny Cash, and assorted things, the Doors also, things that I could use to just warm up my voice. And I think my voice was really raw at that time, because I think the physical stress I was putting on myself (and mentally) when I was making that record.
But that is my favorite record, “Holy Wood,” it’s one of my favorite moments of music, and it does have a lot of moments. So yes, I think there will be some things dug out of the past when we get to that point. But I like doing things acoustically. I actually like to – I’m not afraid to sing in front of other people with a microphone, acoustically, which was something I was shy to do in the past.
I would never want to have people in the studio, I would want to sit in the sound booth. But now I don’t have a problem with it at all. In fact, I wouldn’t mind performing live acoustically as well. I even crashed some innocent strangers’ bachelorette party karaoke a few weeks ago! I don’t know if they wanted a concert or not, but they got it.”
When further asked about putting out material in an acoustic vein:
“Um…as a matter of fact, that’s some of the plans, of the style of music that I’m working on right now.
I don’t know what it’ll turn into. Some of it will be with Jonathan Davis, I think. Because he has plans of doing something similar as well. Something that might even cross over the boundaries of being more Southern-sounding.
It is strange, when I think about it – I did record “Smells Like Children‘ in Mississippi, which is where the blues came from. So there might be something more acoustic and blues in my future.
I like the rawness of it.
I definitely like the rawness.”
On whether or not he and Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails are now “cool”:
“I know I’m cool.
I mean, are you asking are we cool with each other?
I mean, I don’t have a problem with him. I have a problem with some of the things he’s done to me in my career. But at the same time, I have to give him credit where credit is due, as being inspiration when I was starting out and giving me my break.
But we’re not at odds with each other. I just don’t have interest in being friends anymore.”
On if he would have done anything differently in his career:
“Someone asked if I would do anything differently looking back on my career: I probably would’ve been a little less lenient with the way I handled some of the people who betrayed me in the music business. I would have ruled more with an iron fist. But that would have not led me to where I am now, where I have a greater sense of control. So it really frees ambition, to be back in the spot where I have total control over what happens – from the music happens, to recording it, there was a period at my last record label where when I would control the music, I would be record the music that I wanted, but when they got their hands on it, the way they treated it as a product wasn’t the way I would’ve treated it. I probably should’ve beaten some people about it. But I’m glad to be where I am now.”
On if he plans to release a new book or his ‘Holy Wood‘ novels inspired by his 2000 album of the same name:
“Both.
In one answer.”
On whether or not there will be an “Antichrist Superstar” 20th anniversary tour next year:
“Yeah, Twiggy and I were just talking about that a few days ago.
I think that might be something we’d really want to do.
I’ve always really enjoyed that time. The idea of doing that, even when we first put the album out, we played nearly all of it, back in 1996. So I think that there’s a very strong possibility that that’s going to happen.”
On if the band will ever go back to the sound of “Antichrist Superstar” or “Mechanical Animals“:
“It’s hard to go backwards. But it’s always important to stay true to the core of the essence of who you are as a songwriter.
So I think that starting another album with Twiggy, because Twiggy was not involved in “The Pale Emperor” – I think that, if you want to call it, the “throwback sound” – will work its way into there, with a natural way of happening, now that he and I are together. That’ll come back.”
On what he still hopes to accomplish:
“I’d like to direct a movie that I’m not in. Not the one I was planning on doing for many years, about Lewis Carroll.
I’d like to get back to writing, I’d like to take from one of my great inspirations, Hunter S. Thompson, to tell my stories. As anyone who knows me knows, I love to tell my stories. And I like writing.
So it’s about finding the time to balance the two.
I just did a major acting role that I’ve never done before. It’s in Let Me Make You A Martyr. It was in Tulsa. I played a hitman named “Pope.” So that’s in the process of being finished up. It was great to try something that was more elaborate than what I’ve done in the past.”
On acting in ‘Sons Of Anarchy‘:
“I think my favorite part was getting to become close friends with Tommy Flanagan, and Charlie who plays Jax, and Mark, and D.L. – those guys all are really, I guess, like their characters in some way. They all ride bikes, they all took me in, we all became drinking buddies or whatever the case may be. And it was nice to have that camaraderie, because I never really had a lot of best friends other than Twiggy. So I enjoyed that. And as far as the acting went, I guess I liked the challenge of trying to grow a goatee – my facial hair doesn’t grow very quickly! So the challenge of growing a goatee wasn’t too easy.
And I liked that i got to be part of one of my favorite shows of all time. And kill somebody after I had intimate…what we like to call “the struggle snuggle” in prison. Hopefully I never end up on the other end of it in life.”
On whether or not he is ‘truly a Satanist’:
“I’ve never considered myself a Satanist. I was a part of the Church of Satan, with an honorary position, simply because it was one philosophy – because I’ve never looked at it as a religion. Anton LaVey (who wrote the book THE SATANIC BIBLE) taught me a lot of things about life. You know, I’ve been a scholar – self-taught, self-read – I wouldn’t want to limit my view on the possibilities of what there is out there in the spiritual realm to just one thing. Because there’s always something new to open your mind.
To let you see things from a different angle. I do believe in the power of the mind, and the power of certain things. I think that music definitely has to have some element that back in the beginning – and I’m not talking about once Christianity took over America, blaming Rock n’ Roll for bad things – I mean back in the times when music was first invented, and the chords that were used in most rock n’ roll music, they were considered evil – because I think when you put those notes together, they have the ability to disrupt or distract the brain from whatever sort of “virus” of language that religion is, in a sense.
If you have things like a Bible from any different religion – it does have a powerful reign over people’s minds. And music does as well. So there had to be something – if we go by religion’s view of “good vs. evil” – that would be evil, meaning it didn’t agree with those views.”
On the art direction of his latest album “The Pale Emperor“:
“The thing that I wanted to do with the people who collaborated on the album artwork – it’s the first album I’ve never included the lyrics on, and I’ve just now recorded a visual version of me reciting the lyrics, spoken-word, that will be released soon, and also a video for “Third Day of a Seven Day Binge” that was actually recorded many months ago, but that was stopped before we decided to change the order of how it was put out. The CD – I wanted it to be black, because your CD player is thermal, so it turns white, so it starts to fade away. I thought that was a metaphor. And it’s also interesting, when you put your hand on it, it will leave a thermal handprint that fades away.”
