Marilyn Manson — We Are Chaos — Single Review
Late in the night on July 28th, I was mindlessly scrolling through Twitter as per usual when I stumbled across the biggest and best surprise I could have asked for. “Wednesday 9AM PST” accompanied a watercolour photo that resembled Marilyn Manson, and in the top left corner was three words: We Are Chaos. I was starting to freak out, go into meltdown and was overcome with so much excitement. It was a lot to digest and it all came out of nowhere, but the bottom line was that the cycle of Marilyn Manson’s new album was beginning. And in less that 24 hours the world would have gotten it’s first glimpse of everything. Leading up to the release at 9 AM PST — or 5 PM BST, where I am in England — we got a few new photos of Manson shot by long time collaborator Perou. These new snaps showed the self proclaimed God of Fuck in a cowboy hat and suit; one in a black room with his face hidden and another against a blue background, striking a silly pose and showing off a makeup look. It was reminiscent of Manson’s previous ‘Heaven Upside Down’ look, but fused with the country sound of his ‘God’s Gonna Cut You Down’ cover that was released earlier this year.
Previously this year on The Violet Reality I wrote an article about what I hoped the new Manson album would be like. You can give that a read by clicking here, but the two rumours I favoured the most were the idea of the album being a self titled record and being kind of acoustic/country in a dark way. When the announcement came on Tuesday, we learned that the album sadly wasn’t going to be self titled, but is instead called ‘We Are Chaos’. What followed at 5 PM on Wednesday was an animated music video for not only the first single from the album, but the title track too, ‘We Are Chaos’. Immediately my mind started trying to think up what the lyrics could be like, what it’s going to sound like. I remember listening to ‘We Know Where You Fucking Live’ the day it came out as the lead single from ‘Heaven Upside Down’ and it sounded like a pure Manson track. Heavy drums, distorted guitar mixed with explicit and controversial imagery. It was perfect, and I guess I wanted this lead single to be the same. Heavy, hard hitting and controversial. Nothing prepared me for what ‘We Are Chaos’ actually looked or sounded like.
The thing that immediately struck me was the fact it’s an acoustic song. Seconds into hearing it the first time, my mind immediately thought of Beck and his all acoustic album ‘Morning Phase’. Manson isn’t somebody who’s a stranger to doing these stripped back and acoustic songs, in fact they add a whole new and different angle to his more extreme and heavier sounding songs. But what shocked me most was that the title track of his new album was acoustic? I couldn’t get my head around it to begin with. But as the day went on I remembered that in 2001, the title track of Manson’s album ‘Holywood’ was also an acoustic song. Like I say, he’s no stranger to this stuff. But one thing I would say is that, as a whole, this song feels introspective, emotional and mellow. Like he’s tired of doing the same stuff he’s already done over and over, and is looking to go in a brand new direction. But with that, he’s bringing with him more personal and observing lyrics. He’s looking to the future while also looking inwards. In my previous article I mentioned how Manson said he’s been “studying the horrors” in his head, and I feel that ‘We Are Chaos’ is a good example of that.
Lyrically it begins with a woman stating “we need to find some help for you” before it launches into talk of drugs, death, mystery and misery. Perhaps you could say these things are topics Manson has sung about tenfold, but they’re being presented here in a new way. The third verse hears Manson wondering if he’s a show, a moment or the man in the moon. These remarks come across to me personally as him perhaps wondering if he’s a freak show that people watch; if he’s somebody who has had their moment and is no longer relevant; and comparing himself to the fictional character of the man in the moon. But it’s the chorus of the song that really hit me most, and it seems like rather than speaking for just himself, Manson is speaking for all of humanity: “We are sick, fucked up and complicated/We are chaos, we can’t be cured”. It’s felt like he’s saying that we’re all broken beyond compare and no amount of drugs can fix the state that we’re in. And I think in many ways that can be interpreted as true.
Rather than being a traditional story or performance based music video, this one is instead animated but managed to feature a lot of imagery like any other typical Manson era does. He worked with Matt Mahurin for the video, who directed, photographed and edited the whole thing. In it we see Manson under a microscope; as a skull and crossbones; sat singing into a mic and revealed as ordinary people like soldiers and old ladies. It gave an impression of saying that beneath the masks that people wear, we’re everyday people fighting our own battles. We could be at war in our own heads or be physically frail, but still we find the courage to go out and live our lives. Or at least, that’s how I see and interpret the video and song. It’s much more different and unique than any other Manson video, but is very of it’s time considering the current climate of the world. In a way I can see the video being a cross between a digital collage, storyline and performance video all wrapped into one. It’s unique, and Marilyn Manson does unique very well.
But what about Manson himself? In a statement provided to Stereogum, Manson said that when recording the album he told to himself “tame your crazy, stitch your suit. And try to pretend that you are not an animal” which I feel is really reflected in the lead single. Again, the sound is like the Manson of recent years rather than how he made his name; it also seems much more personal and introspective in comparison to his triptych and the themes within it. He also said that he realised “humanity is the worst of them all”, which is another feeling I get from the single. With those ideas in mind, coming straight from Marilyn Manson himself, it’s going to be interesting to see how they play into the rest of the album.
But if there’s anyone who’s going to release an album on September 11th, it’s Marilyn fucking Manson. That’s the date you’ll be able to pick up the album, which has actually been labelled as a concept album. ‘We Are Chaos’ has been produced by Shooter Jennings and, if I recall correctly, features some of his current band members on the album too. It’s going to be available in various different vinyl versions, some of which are very exclusive so if you’re a record lover like me then be sure to pre-order them quickly! It’s also going to be available on CD and Cassette too, in addition to several apparel and accessories with the album cover put up to pre-order as well. I also find it very interesting that Manson has opted to have one of his own paintings as the album cover, and this one is called ‘Infinite Darkness. Manson has had his paintings as single covers in the past, but never an album cover, which again keeps in line with this more personal theme I’m picking up. The album is 10 tracks long, and the tracklist is as follows:
Side A — Red Black And Blue, We Are Chaos, Don’t Chase The Dead, Paint You With My Love, Half-Way & One Step Forward.
Side B — Infinite Darkness, Perfume, Keep My Head Together, Solve Coagula, Broken Needle.
