Album Review: Marilyn Manson – One Assassination Under God Pt.2

by DAN SOUTHALL

MARILYN Manson has been on a personal road to redemption for sometime now. Both professionally and personally, his self-aggrandisement led to him becoming an embarrassing self-parody. 

Of course this wasn’t all self-inflicted: there was a group of allegations from ex-partners, all since unproven. Instead of burying the artist, it seems to have fuelled his most passionate material since the 2000 release of the Holy Wood, an album that was stoked by forces outside his artistic control.

Manson has always been a great story teller, and this album is no different.  Beginning with the eerie darkness that has always suited him, ‘Unalive’ is a journey into his mind and recent mindset, particularly in the bridge where he intones ‘My eyes may cry but I’ll never weep’. 

This open lyrical approach continues into ‘Don’t Answer the Door’, where the refrain of ‘I’m the only enemy you’ll ever need’ really hammers his point home.

Musical partner Tyler Bates genuinely outdoes himself here as he is allowed to let his day job of musical scoring breathe cinematic life into the material. This mental cinema weaving amongst the lyrics is difficult to describe but creates an album that begs to be listened to. 

Bates’ previous contributions to Manson albums merely point to the musical landscapes he has managed to create here. From the heavy industrial thud of ‘Front Toward Enemy’ or the smoky eighties ‘Lucifer’s Teardrop’ and everything in between there isn’t a musical misstep.

With a couple of exceptions I typically find Marilyn Manson boring and overblown, with only a couple of albums worth having in the collection, so he’s doing something right for me to be gushing over One Assassination Under God Pt.2.

Manson and Bates save the best for last. ‘Enantiomorph’ opens with a spoken word piece with Manson expunging himself and preparing the listener for what feels like his final recorded statement before building, crashing and pulsing. Marilyn Manson sounds like an artist renewed by the trials of his fame and the tribulations of recent years.

On this album and its companion piece (Part 1… duh), his lyrics are the most personal and acerbic ever, as he lashes out at everyone and everything he considers an enemy,l potent and important when he is in dangerous form like this. 

This album can be taken in as a whole but when combined with An Assassination… Pt 1 is perhaps the most complete statement on society, fame and American culture he has released, mixed with an unhealthy amount of venom.