Marilyn Manson - Eat, Me Drink Me - to be released June 05, 2007

This is a record review of Marilyn Manson's forthcoming album, "Eat Me, Drink Me", also known as "I'll Just Hire Someone To Play Guitar".

This, Marilyn Manson's sixth studio record, isn't lounge, the direction I strongly recommend Mr. Manson head, and as quickly as possible. But this is different. Tim Skold played most of the instruments on this collaborative effort. He's the reason it's a departure from what's worked (sort of) for Warner in the past. And if you can't tell, it's a train that left a station not on my musical magical mystery tour map, for a destination I'd much rather avoid than spend an afternoon sipping tea with our favorite Antichrist.

Manson's personal shortcomings in the relationship arena are as reasonable a thing to croon about as anything, after all 90% of music is inspired by someone getting dumped. But in this case we are dragged through his self-indulgent self-pity, and I for one would expect a little more depth and introspection from Messier Manson. I think I have given him too much credit in the past - he's down more than a notch with this rock 'n roll tripe.

Decent tracks: Not sure there are any.

01. If I Was Your Vampire  Brooding guitar, our first evidence of Skold's heavy hand on the helm of this shipwrecked project. Not a bad song, some quiet-loud-quiet stuff with interesting lyrics. A slow head-banging anthem.

02. Putting Holes in Happiness  Wow. Now we're into the guitar sound of Skold here. Reminds me of Lenny Kravitz. And yes, that's not a good thing. As the lyrics build toward the chorus, we are hoping for some crunchy industrial noise to pump out, but we're instead greeted with some nasty stripped down pure metal guitar work. And then yes, oh no, the inevitable happens - a fucking guitar solo. Straight ahead. No processing - at least not in any good way, just normal white Anglo metal rock. It's sorta funny. And very sucky.

03. The Red Carpet Grave  Catchy chorus about cumming, can't really fault him for taking that cheap shot. The song is at least a little back in the dark where Manson belongs, but then yes it does some lame guitar picking riffs every so once and again. But for the most part the guitar is in the background where it belongs. Well, until the last few seconds of the song where Skold just unleashes. Too funny.

04. They Said Hell's Not Hot  Opens with a pure guitar riff, reminded me of Social Distortion, which isn't a bad thing, just not the right medicine for Manson. Oh God, another guitar solo - short this time thankfully, but just that perfectly lame-ass metal guitar sound... Noooooo...

05. Just A Car Crash Away  A nice mellow whispy thing, reminded me of "Man that you Fear". Only not great; relies too heavily on the cool verse "Love is just a car crash away" that harkens back to J. G. Ballard's excellent tome "Crash" not to mention the Rolling Stones "Gimme Shelter" - you figure it out. The Sisters of Mercy covered it too, but I don't think Manson intended either connection. But then yes we still have to suffer through the guitar work about 3/4 of the way through. Just plain bad.

06. Heart-shaped Glasses (When the Heart Guides the Hand)  A cute layered sing-along, the lyrics will either quickly become super annoying or maybe just lay there like a dead animal to be poked and made fun of.

07. Evidence  Ponderous opening drumming. Mid-song droning, more like whining, quasi-wailing, guitar.

08. Are You The Rabbit?  70's guitar rock - towards the end there's some screeching guitar meanderings in the background. The overall grind of this track is actually fairly tolerable.

09. Mutilation is the Most Sincere Form of Flattery  Nice use of the word "Fuck" liberally sprinkled like pepper on a Ceasar salad, but as always it falls victim to Skold's guitar.

10. You and Me and the Devil Makes 3  Eastern musical motif dropped into this one, a cheap attempt to make it more transcendently spiritual than Manson could ever be.

11. Eat Me, Drink Me  Starts out promising, a slow mellow gait that could open up to a stampede... that never comes. But at least it sounds good. And, please, Manson, that's all we, your fans, ever really wanted.

Gone are the interesting tones and textures and explorations into the creepy evilness that Manson was once so miraculously capable of feeding us.

Synopsis: Enough swear words to keep the kids happy, but this is neither goth nor dark metal nor industrial nor, well, good. But I expected as much from Manson, who's always been a better visual artist than aural, with the massive exceptions of "Antichrist Superstar" and of course his earlier masterpiece "Portrait of an American Family".

Rating: 4 out of 10

Brought to you by The Bad Man.