MARILYN MANSON Talks About Writing Music With TWIGGY RAMIREZ Again

Amy Sciarretto of Noisecreep recently conducted an interview with Marilyn Manson. An excerpt from the chat follows below.

Noisecreep: How much did your reunion with bassist Twiggy Ramirez spark the creativity on this record?

Manson: It's about me realizing the importance of loss, I even say, "I am going to teach you about loss." There are various degrees of things going on in my life and when you get back with a friend, you realize the void that it created, when it's back together. It was as if no time had passed. Separately, we did a lot on our own and we both can stand on our own. What we do together on this record, no one else can do. This is the record we wanted to make, at the right time, as friends. We needed each other. We had gone through parallel emotions with relationships and didn't have each other as best friends to say, "I am going through this torment." He came to the plate with this music which sounded like what I wanted to say. It was intimidating, for me, that I had to take it up a level, and do and say something I had not said before. My part as the singer and lyricist took place between November and January 5. I finished on my birthday. During that period, I lived alone, which I had never done before. I had gone from living with my parents as everyone does, to starting a band, going on tour and living in hotels and in and out of different relationships. Then in November, the last relationship I was in ended with me living alone and it became a process. I spent, by choice, the holiday season alone!

Noisecreep: You don't seem like a big "holiday celebration" type guy!

Manson: I am not big on holidays, but I spent Christmas, New Year's Eve and my birthday entirely alone. I returned to the studio, did the last three tracks. I woke up thinking, "I have to sing this song and finish this record," which isn't about giving up what you are. It's about seeing what doesn't work and hating everyone and trying to destroy it. Without that feeling, the song "Devour" would not exist. That's about a murder/suicide that almost happened and the song is why it didn't happen, so it began the record. The person who wrote that song is not the same person who wrote the last track, "15". I changed, people make mistakes. Now, I see that showing kindness and love shouldn't be mistaken for weakness. I am not desperate for love; it is something I have decided upon. I could have ended [the record] being null, like ["American Psycho"'s] Patrick Bateman, without any sense of reality or contact with humanity. Track "15" is like when you walk out of theater, after the end title credits and what you didn't expect to happen...happened.

Read the entire interview from Noisecreep.