The video for Marilyn Manson’s “Slo-Mo-Tion” opens with the following warning: “This video may contain offensive imagery.” Which feels more like a limp assertion of Manson’s waning credentials as a legitimately transgressive pop-cultural force than a true attempt at protecting our nation’s children, if you ask me.
The forty-something shock-rocker is up to the same old shtick he’s been peddling for two decades now in the brand-new clip – the second from his most recent album “Born Villain” – in which his stabs at edginess include such beaten-to-death motifs as creepy headgear, beautiful topless women, twisted displays of androgyny, firearm worship and, yes, that ever-present middle finger.
Look, you’ve gotta hand it to the guy – he still churns out a new disc every couple of years when most of his contemporaries have since faded into near-obscurity. The problem is, his shallow bag of tricks was emptied long ago, and he’s been recycling the same basic material – albeit a far less effective version of it – ever since he first garnered attention with his full-length debut, 1994’s “Portrait of an American Family.”
And it’s too bad, because for a time at least – specifically with 1998’s glossy glam-rock opus “Mechanical Animals” – Manson made a legitimate attempt at transforming his sound and image. Nevertheless, his growth as an artist seemed to stall out somewhere around the turn of the millenium, and ever since he’s been trotting out increasingly-flimsy variations on his most successful album, 1996’s “Antichrist Superstar.” Which is fine, but it’s certainly not going to win him any new fans.
My grade for the video: D. After watching it below, rate it for yourself at top left.