Marilyn Manson @ Birmingham Academy – 13th December 2009

The life of Brian (Warner) aka Marilyn Manson is a strange one. Is he absurd? Is he a Blaine? No, he’s the uberman, spawn of the Devil; come to Earth to impregnate ever anticipated horrors in the expectant wombs of the virgin Daughters of the American Revolution: possibly!

Manson is the fooltide evangelist, capturing the epiphianic zeitgeist with anti-Christmas exorcistentialism. But, then again, he claims he’s no slave to God.

Before a humidly challenged punter-packed Academy crowd Manson is beholden as the Phantom of Schlock n’ ghoul opera. The acolytes of the Manson milieu are a thing to themselves. The Academy management wisely, deferring to a more informal dress code ( it is the Sabbath, and the 13th!) where ironically, informality is the new conformity. Tattoos are derigure, as is leather, boa-feather, spandex, bras of Playtex and, intriguingly, suggestions of Durex and Pyrex: wide berth given there.

Manson and his band, the apocalypse of neo-Metal brutalism, lunge into the opening number, which, try as one might to name, draws an utter blank from the surrounding punters. Clarity of lyricism is not high on Manson’s agenda. No matter, before a blood/smoked back-lit minimalist stage, laser red talons seem to blaze from the master’s finger tips like the Emperor zapping Luke Skywalker for making him bite his nails to the quick. And the crowd cry out for more. Is he the bastard incubi of Arthur Brown’s knob of Hellfire? Alice Cooper’s hissing trouser snake? You laugh or you weep in ennui, but it’s sure as hell great pantomime where the costume horse is two-arse ended. The emasculated misconception has taken hold of the lost souls and the night belongs to him.

In no particular order: we embrace a chaotic intro to ‘Anti-Christ Motherfucker’ with Manson in attack guitar mode playing in a disconcerting guillotine Ragga epileptic timbre. He pays homage to Birmingham for being the crucible of very Heavy Metal thunder, as he should do. This, of course, now has any remaining dissed-believers eating out of the charm of his glands. Quite why the next number had him wearing what appeared to be an air-raid warden’s tin helmet with wrap-around Union flag rather escaped us. Needless to say he launches another salvo of weapons-grade, sub-atomic bastothrash. This band are as tight and gritty as a camel’s sphincter in a sandstorm.

And so the show goes on. The theatrics of this preacher man, Bible-burning routine to a backdrop of descending black glitter was blasphemously entertaining. This lad sure ain’t going to Hell in a handcart — it’ll be a skip full of leapers. He tends to bring out the best in people, somehow. ‘Jackass’ goes down well, as might possibly do some of his evidently animated thong-juicing girly disciples if they can get to him after the show. We learn that, ‘Rock is not fucking dead.’ The show draws to a climax with, ‘Rock ‘n Roll Nigger’ with lyrics not quite what the title might immediately suggest but it would be worth hearing Melanie Phillips chew on them. We have a health and safety check about the misuse of cocaine: the moral being, don’t touch his stash. Eurythmics cover ‘Sweet Dreams’ is laden with Satanic irony and unleashes a maelstrom of crowd appreciation. Offensive, corrupting, Apocalypse Now? Not really. It’s escapism, licence to thrill, getting one’s jollies through dysfunctional displacement and we’re all the better for it.

Review – John Kennedy
Photos – Chris Barber

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