Marilyn Manson on Horror Films, "Whore Films," Witches, Ghost Encounters | Page 2 | Revolver

Marilyn Manson on Horror Films, "Whore Films," Witches, Ghost Encounters

"When I was in Christian school, I was always checking to see if I had 666 tattooed on my scalp"
marilyn manson 2012 SHINN, Travis Shinn
Marilyn Manson, 2012
photograph by Travis Shinn

This story was originally published in October 2012.

"If you're trying to shock people, the most important thing you can do in horror or rock and roll—which I think go hand in hand, when it comes to what I love—is use confusion and chaos," says Marilyn Manson, as he welcomes Revolver into his West Hollywood lair. "I just got a stun gun, for example, which is very shocking," he adds, reaching into his refrigerator and offering us a beer. "And I will try it out on your balls, if you like."

While we have to admit that we're not in the mood for a high voltage jolt to the 'nads this evening, the convergence of horror and rock and roll is very much on the agenda. Manson certainly already knows a thing or two about both art forms, and now that the first leg of touring to support his new Born Villain album is behind him, he's preparing to raise the horror-rock bar with his participation in the Twins of Evil tour, a co-headlining jaunt with Rob Zombie that will terrorize the US, the UK and Europe this fall. Opening the shows is Korn frontman Jonathan Davis, who will be serving up a DJ set of demonic electronic-dance music under the moniker of JDevil.

The pairing of Zombie and Manson seems so perfect (and perfectly obvious) that we initially figured they must have toured together before—but nope, this'll be the first time they've ever wreaked extended havoc in tandem, and Manson appears to be looking forward to it as much as we are.

"It's really what people want," he says. "And I've always been the one to go away from what the obvious thing to do is, but sometimes it's not a cliché to do the obvious thing."

So pull up a high-backed torture chair and join us as we get the lowdown from Manson on the Twins of Evil tour, as well as his new video for "Slo-Mo-Tion," his love of psychological horror, his possible brushes with ghosts and the music and films that completely freaked him out as a kid. Just remember to keep your legs crossed—the man has a stun gun, and he's not afraid to use it.

HOW DID THE TOUR WITH YOU AND ROB ZOMBIE FINALLY COME ABOUT?
MARILYN MANSON The tour was Rob's idea. My manager came to me and said, "So, this came up and you probably won't want to do this, but what about a tour with Rob Zombie?" And I said, "Perfect!" And of course, the reason why he or anyone else might have assumed I wouldn't want to do it is that two of my ex-band members [guitarist John 5 and drummer Ginger Fish] are in Rob Zombie's band. First of all, I get to fuck with them again, and they're not in my band — that's a bonus, right there! Second of all, I was a huge fan of White Zombie from the get-go, when I was just starting Marilyn Manson. I don't know Rob very well. We've known each other for years, but we've never had enough time to hang out. I always have liked him as a person. So I said yes right away. Knowing that the sentence started with, "You probably won't want to do this…" Yes, I'm going to do this! And then the next sentence was, "I know you're really not going to want to have Jonathan Davis DJing before you." Oh, yes I am  —100 percent yes!

HOW CLOSE ARE YOU WITH JONATHAN DAVIS?
I know Jonathan a lot closer than I know Rob. We've had some intimate moments. That sounded wrong, but actually it's a bit true, in the sense that I have seen him naked, and it was not a sexual situation. It involved me, and a belt, and I was not the one getting hit with the belt. Let's just leave it at that. [Laughs] Honestly, if I were in a different state of mind, and I had the ignorance to be arrogant enough to not want to do a tour with two people I've shared stages with before… [Joining this tour] is not me being mature, it's just me thinking this seems like it'll be fun — and playing with Rob Zombie is better than most of the other bands I've been stuck playing with that I didn't choose. That's not naming anyone specifically, but when you go on tour, you don't have a choice a lot of times. Rob has gone out of his way to give people what they want, and I think it's going to be cool to tour with them. And whether we hang out or not, I'm definitely going to torture John 5, there is no doubt about that. That is 100 percent for sure.

SINCE THIS INTERVIEW IS FOR OUR HORROR ISSUE, WE WANT TO ASK YOU ABOUT SOME YOUR FAVORITE HORROR FILMS.
Oh, great — I like whore films! [Laughs] "Horror" is a very troublesome word, especially if you're not an American. When I was in Japan, it was Halloween time, and I found out that the Japanese have a great fascination with witchcraft. In the Halloween store, the costumes were all like "Golden Witch," "Fairy Witch," "Angry Witch"… It was like walking into The Craft, but mixed with Contempo Casuals. And these Japanese girls that were showing me around said, "Are you going to heroin party?" And I said, "I don't do heroin, but that sounds really great — where's that at?" It turned out that they meant Halloween. I'm not making fun of their accent, but I thought that they said "heroin party." So, whore films, horror films…

WHAT ARE SOME FILMS THAT YOU'VE FOUND GENUINELY FRIGHTENING?
What scares me? As a kid — and still now to a certain degree, but for different reasons — supernatural horror scared the shit out of me, because I was in Christian school, so I was always afraid of things related to the Devil, to the extent that I was always checking my scalp to see if I had "666" tattooed on my scalp. I didn't know if that tattoo in The Omen actually appeared, or if they took that kid to a tattoo parlor. [Laughs] I was also afraid of that movie It's Alive when I was a kid. I don't know why, but I was always checking under my bed for a stray baby with fangs. Why would that be under my bed?

WHAT KIND OF HORROR FILMS DO YOU LIKE THESE DAYS?
I like horror films where you identify strongly with the person who is in peril. Not in the slasher way, like Jamie Lee Curtis in Halloween. Maybe when I was younger, I liked those, and I still can enjoy them, but I like psychological horror films that are more in a Roman Polanski/Ingmar Bergman sense. When I watch slasher films, nine times out of 10, I'm rooting for the killer. I'm thinking, Yes, get that fucker! Get him! I do! That's what horror films have transformed into. It's really difficult, if you think about it, to make a horror film in an era when people have made so many horror films. How do you make a monster that's scary? I love zombie films, but not for the reasons people might assume. What I like about them is what happens in the room. For example, if the world starts ending outside and we're locked in here, it's not the shit outside that's scary — it's what people do in that situation, when their morals and their behavior, their ideals, and everything that you thought they stood for changes. Survival instinct would kick in for some people, but you know at the end of the day that you're going to make judgment calls. And that's really what I like about The Walking Dead. I think it's sophisticated. A lot of people complain, "Aw, there's not enough zombies." That's what's great about it. You never give away too much of what is precious — and that goes with music, and that goes with everything. That's the key to what keeps people attached to things. It's like, "Just the tip, not the shaft." [Laughs]

SPEAKING OF PSYCHOLOGICAL HORROR, HAVE YOU EVER SEEN DON'T LOOK NOW, THE '70S MOVIE STARRING DONALD SUTHERLAND, ABOUT A MARRIED COUPLE DEALING WITH THE DEATH OF THEIR DAUGHTER?
That's so fucking crazy that you just mentioned that — I just queued it up on Netflix. But yes, I have seen it, and it's very, very terrifying — that's what I would consider to be scary.

BUT IT'S ALSO HARD TO IMAGINE THAT ANY MAJOR STUDIO THESE DAYS WOULD RELEASE A HORROR FILM THAT UNFOLDS WITH THAT SORT OF SLOW AND DELIBERATE PACE.
I think it's irresponsible as an artist or as a person to dumb things down, just because our culture is not as attentive as it should be. I mean, it's really that simple. That's why I like the element of the movie theater, where you shut everything else out, and I like to translate that to the stage — that's what my show's going to be like on this tour. This is a show, make no mistake, but the minute you say, "This is a show," or "You're crazy," or "My dick is big," it automatically is not that, because it's giving away the ending. It's about making it all about the tension. It's about what you don't see. The fact that you don't see the baby in Rosemary's Baby — your mind is going to create more terrifying things.

WHAT'S THE SCARIEST NON-HORROR MOVIE THAT YOU'VE EVER SEEN?
Hour of the Wolf, by Ingmar Bergman. It's about a painter who goes crazy, and the questions of if crazy is contagious — and if you love someone enough, do you become like them? It was originally supposed to be called The Cannibals, and it was supposed to be Ingmar Bergman's vampire film. He manages to capture a moment on camera, it's almost a solid minute of [actor] Max Von Sydow holding a match in super close-up, and he's talking about how horrible it is to try and fall asleep, and he has to wait for the sun to come up. And then the match goes out, and he has to light another one, and he talks about how 3 A.M. is when most babies are born and most people die, and that's when scary shit happens — that is the Hour of the Wolf. People consider midnight to be the "witching hour," but 3 A.M. is when I'm most creative. Maybe it is because then all the people are asleep, and their brain energy or static is not happening, and it's quiet and no phones are ringing. That's when I paint. That's when I'm at my peak. That's why I keep late hours, simply because it enables me to be more creative. I like to keep myself in an isolated environment. Which also relates greatly to movie theaters, which I hope do not become a dying phenomenon. This is essentially like a movie theater, my place. It's an escape. I get really upset when I'm hanging out watching a horror film and my friends are fucking around on their phones. I like to get wrapped into it. I like to go into that world. And I think the only way you can scare yourself is by letting go. I think loss of control is the ultimate horror.

WHAT DO YOU THINK OF ROB ZOMBIE'S FILMS?
I think I did not want to like his horror films when he started doing them, only out of my own ego — that I wanted to be directing films, also. But when I saw them, they appealed to me in all the ways I think he meant them to appeal to people. I think he's a great director. I like that he brings back elements of culture that are forgotten. One of the things I like about what Rob does is that he reinterprets old films, but that's a difficult job — that's like covering "Sweet Dreams." It's a difficult job to go back and fuck with somebody's shit, but it's also the basis of the evolution of creativity. If you don't steal, then you're not really an artist—you just have to make it your own. The difficulty that's presented with music and with horror and with anything — maybe even sex — is that everything's been done. But then you have to think about The Bible: It's got every element of horror films in it. You've got torture. You've got zombies. You've got demons. You've got the Devil. You've got vampirism — eating the flesh, drinking the blood. You've got giants. You've got ghosts. You've got the Apocalypse or Armageddon, or whatever. You've got all the ingredients of every fucking horror film that could ever be made.

SOME OF WHICH YOU'VE CERTAINLY INCORPORATED INTO YOUR OWN VIDEOS.
I just filmed my video for "Slo-Mo-Tion," and I've very proud to say that Steve Little, who plays Stevie Janowski on Eastbound & Down, is in my new video — and he's wearing tits. Steve was really cool to work with. He said, "I always play comedic roles, and I want to play something scary." My thought immediately went to him wearing an outfit that I'd originally bought for me, which I thought would be the perfect outfit for a serial killer, if you were making a horror film. I found this Japanese website that makes expressionless, realistic masks and tit suits. Again, I'm not saying anything against Japan — I love Japan – but some strange things come from that part of the world. So anyway, I bought this outfit, and I wanted to wear it, but then Steve Little said to me, "I really want to be scarier than you." And I said, "Well, how 'bout this outfit?" He wanted to be scary in a way like that scene in Blue Velvet where Dean Stockwell sings "In Dreams," so the only thing I did was take some lipstick and make little dots of rouge on his cheeks, and it really took it to the next level. And I gave him my black leather gloves. Whenever someone puts on black leather gloves, you should be scared.

HAVE YOU EVER ACTUALLY BEEN GENUINELY SCARED BY MUSIC?
Yes, as a matter of fact. I remember going to Quonset Hut in Canton, Ohio when I was 14, and I bought Slayer's Live Undead picture disc. My mom got mad because it just sounded chaotic to her — and it might have been the music, or it might have been the poor needle on my record player. I brought it back and they didn't have another one, so I exchanged it for Venom's Possessed album. I brought it home and it scared the fuck out of me. It was just like "RARRRRRR!" So I said it was scratched, and had my mom return that one, too. [Laughs] They got a lot of returns at that record store! But other than that… Listening to the score for Twin Peaks on headphones made me feel uncomfortable. Beethoven's "Moonlight Sonata" makes me feel nervous — I love it, but... Goblin, that shit scared me — I remember waking up once when I was 9 or 10 years old, and Suspiria was on TV. I just remember that scene of the maggots falling from the ceiling, and that score just stuck with me. Not ironically, that's what we use as the intro music to our show, the theme from Suspiria.

WHAT ABOUT SUPERNATURAL HORROR? ARE YOU AFRAID OF GHOSTS?
Yeah. I still have a fascination with the possibility that the supernatural world exists. Going back, I've had different opinions about ghosts. When I was really young, I remember going my great-grandmother's house or something for a family event — I don't remember all the details, because I was only 4 or 5. I just remember strange smells and temperature changes, which — according to what we read and seen in Paranormal Activity and things of that nature — would be related to ghosts. I think my first moment of being afraid of anything was seeing The Exorcist. It really, really upset me. That movie's still scary to this day. Whether you believe in religion or not, it's still upsetting, because it doesn't really end with an answer. Things that leave you without an answer tend to be the key to anything powerful. The question mark, that's the key to all art. When it comes to ghosts, there isn't an answer — that's the whole thing.

DO YOU WATCH ANY OF THOSE GHOST-HUNTING SHOWS ON TV?
I started to watch that show Paranormal State, merely out of amusement, because that guy's voice is absurdly ridiculous [mimics host Ryan Buell]: "When I was a young kid, I experienced a lot of paranormal events!" He has a team of people, and they go out and investigate things, and nothing ever happens. It's like, they hear a door shut. "Did you see that?! That flash of light?!" I've seen Jesus eating out my dead grandma's asshole and crawling up my leg with maggots on fire more often than they've seen a ghost. I haven't actually seen that, but I would like to see that — that would be much more interesting than Paranormal State.

HAVE YOU SEEN OR EXPERIENCED ANY GHOSTS IN RECENT YEARS?
I remember the house I lived in up on San Marco Drive, under that big cross in the Hollywood Hills. It was post-Columbine, and I was in a state of disarray, and I was really obsessed with all of the interconnections between Manson and Kennedy and [1940s occultist] Jack Parsons and Death Valley and Aleister Crowley, all things related to the supernatural world in some way or another. I used to hear things, and I used to see things, and it was always dismissed by whoever was with me at the time as me being drug paranoid. I also considered that, and some of that may have been true. I used to think there were always people in my yard, or across the street on the hill, and it would keep me up at night. It was upsetting me. I thought maybe the house was haunted — or maybe it was haunted by me. It had every reason to be haunted. Sitting at the top of my stairs, I had a skeleton from a masonic temple with an elk's head that was from the 19th century — right out of the gate, you're inviting a haunting there. And it was [1940s film star] Mary Astor's house, and there were all of the trappings that I accumulated through the years, pieces that may or may not contain energy, depending on whatever you think regarding the transference of previous owners' energy. I had [Adolf Hitler's longtime companion and wife of less than 40 hours before their suicides] Eva Braun's hair comb, things like that. So it really drove me crazy, and I started to think that maybe I haunted the house, that I haunted myself, because I think ghosts can be part of your brain that's not unleashed.

SO YOU THINK THERE MIGHT BE A PSYCHOLOGICAL COMPONENT TO PARANORMAL ACTIVITY?
There's a fine line between mental illness and the supernatural, and I don't think anyone's figured it out. I do know that I don't believe in psychiatry. I don't believe in prescription drugs. Only street drugs — they're more dangerous, more fun, more unpredictable. And you don't have to talk about your problems in order to get the drugs. You just do them, and then you talk about your problems to whoever you're doing them with. [Laughs] And then you see ghosts!

Below, see Marilyn Manson play "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)" with Johnny Depp at the 2012 Revolver Golden Gods: