MARILYN MANSON — Holy Wood (In the Shadow of the Valley of Death)

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3.48 | 18 ratings | 2 reviews

Album · 2000

Filed under Industrial Metal
By MARILYN MANSON

Tracklist

1. Godeatgod (2:34)
2. The Love Song (3:20)
3. The Fight Song (3:01)
4. Disposable Teens (3:03)
5. Target Audience (Narcissus Narcosis) (4:22)
6. "President Dead" (3:13)
7. In the Shadow of the Valley of Death (4:10)
8. Cruci-Fiction in Space (4:56)
9. A Place in the Dirt (3:37)
10. The Nobodies (3:34)
11. The Death Song (3:30)
12. Lamb of God (4:39)
13. Born Again (3:23)
14. Burning Flag (3:23)
15. Coma Black: A) Eden Eye / B) The Apple of Discord (5:58)
16. Valentine's Day (3:31)
17. The Fall of Adam (2:34)
18. King Kill 33° (2:17)
19. Count to Six and Die (The Vacuum of Infinite Space Encompassing) (3:23)

Total Time: 68:36

Line-up/Musicians

- Marilyn Manson / vocals, syncussion, optigan, mellotron, distorted flute, synth bass, keyboards, piano, electric harpsichord, rhythm guitar
- Twiggy Ramirez / bass, guitar (rhythm, lead, Leslie, warped), keyboards
- John 5 / guitar (lead, rhythm, acoustic, synth, electric, slide, phase)
- Madonna Wayne Gacy / synths, ambiance, keyboards, samples, bass synth, synth strings, mellotron, sound effects
- Ginger Fish / drums (live, drum machine), sound effects, keyboards

About this release

Nothing, Interscope, November 13, 2000.

Thanks to Unitron for the updates

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SilentScream213

Marilyn Manson’s third album in his original triptych, although chronologically this is the first in the story. A myriad of drama surrounds this album, with the columbine massacre occurring the previous year in which Manson was blamed. The album and concept is deeply layered within a tale exploring celebrity, consumerism, death, and much more. But writing about the history, context, and story of the album could fill a research paper – and you can find it all on Wikipedia anyway – so I’ll write instead about how I feel about the music.

The album opens with many of the most “normal” sounding songs that would become classics defining the band’s sound. “The love Song,” “The Fight Song,” and “Disposable Teens” are all the most easily consumed and straightforward Rock songs on the album. They’ve got a driving, darkly uplifting aura to them like a call to arms for disenfranchised misfits. Not my favorite songs on the album, but they do a great job opening things up.

It gets a lot more interesting in the next chapter. “Target Audience” is darker, gloomier, and heavier, and title track “In the Shadow of the Valley of Death” is plainly one of the most depressing songs I’ve ever heard, and remains among my top 5 Manson songs of all time. Perfect atmosphere and emotion on that track. The following two tracks in the second chapter explore a more weird and artsy direction for the album.

The third chapter is my favorite. It’s got the anthemic “The Nobodies,” the beautifully sad “Lamb of God,” and the most aggressive track on the album “Burning Flag.” This chapter is the most consistent with zero filler, all the tracks are memorable, unique, and full of passion. The fourth and final chapter contains the magnificent “Coma Black,” a sequel (or prequel actually) to Mechanical Animals closer “Coma White.” The album concludes in a trilogy of shorter simpler tracks that aren’t as memorable at first, but over the years I’ve come to really enjoy how they flow together and snuff out the burning fire of Holy Wood.

Definitely one of Manson’s best albums, and includes so many of the band’s all-time best songs. Also astounding that despite being 19 tracks long, there isn’t one track I would call filler or bad. A fantastic concept album full of individual tracks easily enjoyed all on their own.

18 days ago
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Warthur

I was actually surprised by how much this one has grown on me. As usual with Marilyn Manson, the album is improved if you can clear your head of all the pretentious, self-aggrandising, solipsistic nonsense Manson has said about it and give up on trying to interpret it as a narrative concept album. Instead, simply kick back and watch as Manson seizes the moment when the religious right made him the American scapegoat he'd always claimed to be - and uses it to its full advantage to launch an all out attack on the ugly tendency in American politics to embroil the three totems of "guns, god and government".

Indeed, Manson's lyrics this time around are actually the most effective they've ever been. Paraphrasing the Beatles at one point, Manson deftly creates a dire warning of a youth culture which, turning its back on the peaceful political agenda and methods advocated by the Beatles, may yet prove to be a fertile ground for the encouragement of political violence - the sort of ugly assassination culture which has cropped up again and again in American history (and the reference to James Shelby Downard's bizarre King Kill 33 conspiracy theory is surely no accident there). Add to that a near-frightening obsession with death and what you have is Manson, for one brief moment in his career, actually presenting the sort of compelling and intelligent ideas he's capable of formulating when his pretentiousness isn't getting in the way.

And musically speaking, it's a real trip too taking on sounds from pop punk to Radiohead/Pink Floyd space rock - but always with enough of a grimy industrial tinge to remind us that we're no longer in the sterile territory of Mechanical Animals. Perhaps Manson's backwards narrative concept album trilogy doesn't make a blind lick of sense - but if you approach it as a rock music meditation on a culture out to both idolise and blame transient celebrities instead of turning its sights on the real and persistent issues affecting it, Holy Wood is a fun listen.

The big problem with the album is that very much doesn't want you to take it as a fun listen - it wants you to take it as a big artistic statement, and that means it keeps getting in the way of itself. Manson's recurring JFK imagery also gets tiresome - it's like he realised he hit on something zeitgeist-ish with the Coma White music video and decided to build the entire album around it, despite the fact that the Manson-as-JFK thing ceased to be novel after the music video already explored it enough.