50 Fun Facts About Marilyn Manson

Early Marilyn Manson band members paired a female icon's first name with the surname of what kind of figure?

A serial killer supplied each surname, which is how keyboardist Madonna Wayne Gacy got his stage name. The band dropped the rule in 1996, when a new guitarist joined as Zim Zum.

Marilyn Manson is godfather to Lily-Rose, the daughter of French singer Vanessa Paradis and which American actor?

Johnny Depp made his friend godfather to Lily-Rose, who was born in 1999. The actor later played guitar on the band's cover of Carly Simon's You're So Vain.

Marilyn Manson's breakthrough cover of Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This) reworked a 1983 hit by which British duo?

Eurythmics took the original to number one in the United States in 1983. The 1995 remake's video went into heavy rotation on MTV and made the band a mainstream act.

Marilyn Manson's Rock Is Dead sits beside Rammstein and Rage Against the Machine on the soundtrack of which 1999 film?

The Matrix used the song about six months after it first appeared on a 1998 album, and it was then released as a single from the soundtrack. A second cut of the music video mixed in clips from the film.

Marilyn Manson put his name to a Swiss-made brand of which spirit, winning a gold medal in San Francisco in 2008?

Absinthe sold as Mansinthe took that medal at the San Francisco World Spirits Competition, though some critics called the taste plain. The singer said in 2015 that he no longer drank it.

Marilyn Manson was interviewed about being blamed for a 1999 school shooting in which Michael Moore documentary?

Bowling for Columbine filmed the interview on the day the band played Denver in 2001, their first Colorado show since the shooting.

Which industrial rock musician signed Marilyn Manson to his Nothing Records label and co-produced the band's debut?

Trent Reznor became the singer's mentor and co-produced the band's first two studio albums. The band was the first act signed to the label, in 1993.

Marilyn Manson covered This Is Halloween for a 2006 special-edition soundtrack of which Tim Burton-produced film?

The Nightmare Before Christmas got the cover for a special-edition release of its soundtrack. The recording returned in 2008 on the tribute album Nightmare Revisited.

Marilyn Manson played imprisoned white supremacist Ron Tully in the final season of which American crime drama?

Sons of Anarchy cast him as Ron Tully, an Aryan Brotherhood shot caller locked up alongside Juice, for its seventh and last season.

Marilyn Manson's 1998 glam makeover borrowed its wardrobe and hairstyle from which British rock star of the 1970s?

David Bowie was the model for the look, which the singer said he adopted to avoid being cast as a bogeyman. Giant billboards showed him as an androgynous extraterrestrial.

Which birth name did Marilyn Manson's mother keep using after his father switched to calling him Manson?

Brian Warner stayed Brian to his mother, while his father began calling him Manson around 1993 as a mark of respect for the artist. The singer has also said he registered the stage name as a trademark.

Marilyn Manson was born in which Ohio city, best known as the home of the Pro Football Hall of Fame?

Canton was home until he graduated from nearby GlenOak High School in 1987, then moved with his parents to Florida and started the band.

Which English electronic band first recorded Personal Jesus, covered by Marilyn Manson for a 2004 greatest hits album?

Depeche Mode released the original in 1989 as the lead single from Violator. The remake was the only previously unreleased recording on the compilation Lest We Forget.

Marilyn Manson made his film debut with a small part in which David Lynch movie?

Lost Highway also used two of the band's recordings on its soundtrack, including Apple of Sodom, which was written specifically for the film.

Which star of Scream and Charmed was engaged to Marilyn Manson for nearly two years from 1999?

Rose McGowan ended the engagement in January 2001. The singer had taken a small role in her 1999 film Jawbreaker.

Which performer married Marilyn Manson in 2005, with a ceremony at an Irish castle led by director Alejandro Jodorowsky?

Dita Von Teese filed for divorce at the end of 2006, about a year after the castle ceremony. The burlesque star had already performed in the band's music videos.

Marilyn Manson's hit cover of Tainted Love was recorded for the soundtrack of which 2001 comedy film?

Not Another Teen Movie built its soundtrack largely from contemporary covers of 1980s hits. This one became an international hit in 2002, reaching number five on the UK singles chart.

Marilyn Manson's single God's Gonna Cut You Down is a folk song best known from which country singer's posthumous album?

Johnny Cash recorded it for American V: A Hundred Highways, released posthumously in 2006. The band cut its version during sessions for a 2017 album and issued it as a stand-alone single in 2019.

Marilyn Manson appears in the music video for The Way I Am, a 2000 single by which rapper who name-checks him?

Eminem invited him into the video, where he appears behind the rapper as the song mentions his name. The singer has also performed the track live on stage with the rapper.

Marilyn Manson added guest vocals to a remix of LoveGame, an early single by which pop star?

Lady Gaga took LoveGame from her debut album The Fame. The Chew Fu GhettoHouse Fix remix, with his vocals, was a b-side on the single.

Marilyn Manson enrolled at Broward Community College in Florida in 1990 to work toward a degree in which subject?

Journalism led him to write for the music magazine 25th Parallel, where he interviewed several of the musicians his own work was later compared to.

Marilyn Manson says lessons on forbidden records backfired at which kind of Ohio school he attended until tenth grade?

Christian schooling at Heritage ran from first to tenth grade, and he says its warnings made him fall in love with the music he was told to avoid.

Twins of Evil was a run of co-headlining tours pairing Marilyn Manson with which rocker turned horror film director?

Rob Zombie first shared the bill in 2012, and the pair revived it for later runs subtitled The Second Coming and Hell Never Dies.

Marilyn Manson sings on Bad Girl, a track from the 2013 self-titled album by which Canadian singer?

Avril Lavigne had never used featured vocalists before that album, which has two: the shock rocker and Chad Kroeger.

Which 1996 Marilyn Manson album, a rock opera recorded in New Orleans, debuted at number three on the Billboard 200?

Antichrist Superstar sold almost two million copies in the United States alone, and protesters met the tour that followed at nearly every North American venue.

Which 1996 Marilyn Manson single takes its title from a 1967 book about scandal among the jet set?

The Beautiful People borrows the name of Marylin Bender's book on the jet-set world of fashion and politics. Its video earned three nominations at the 1997 MTV Video Music Awards.

Which rock veteran sued New Jersey officials after a 1997 festival date was cancelled over Marilyn Manson's booking?

Ozzy Osbourne went to court over the Giants Stadium date of his own touring festival, Ozzfest. Several states had passed laws to keep the band out of state-run venues, which were later repealed.

Which 1998 album gave Marilyn Manson a first US number one and cast the singer as an alien called Omega?

Mechanical Animals sold 223,000 copies in its first week, yet it ended up as the lowest-selling number-one album of 1998 in the United States.

Marilyn Manson & the Spooky Kids formed in 1989 and soon sold out small nightclubs from a base in which Florida city?

Fort Lauderdale nightclub The Reunion Room is where the singer first conceived the band in December 1989. Within six months they were filling 300-capacity clubs across the state.

Which 2000 Marilyn Manson album closed a trilogy and answered those who blamed the band for a Colorado school shooting?

Holy Wood begins the trilogy's story even though it came out last, because the singer says the three albums tell their tale in reverse order.

Which Marilyn Manson bassist, born Jeordie White, also played with A Perfect Circle and toured with Nine Inch Nails?

Twiggy Ramirez joined at the end of 1993, when his predecessor was ejected, and served two long stints before being dismissed in 2017.

Which guitarist, given his stage name by Marilyn Manson in 1998, became a full member of Mötley Crüe in 2023?

John 5 got the name from the Bible chapter and from being the fifth member of the band. He had just left David Lee Roth's solo group.

Marilyn Manson's 2003 album The Golden Age of Grotesque drew on the cabaret and burlesque of which 1920s city?

Berlin under the Weimar Republic supplied the swing and vaudeville the record borrows from, and its artwork drew on illustrations in Mel Gordon's book Voluptuous Panic.

Marilyn Manson's 1995 EP Smells Like Children keeps referring to the Child Catcher, the villain of which musical film?

Chitty Chitty Bang Bang was even sampled without permission on early promotional copies of the EP, so the track listing had to be re-edited for public release.

Which organization, founded by Anton LaVey, gave Marilyn Manson an honorary priesthood that he later played down?

Church of Satan officials say he was never ordained as a minister, and that the honorary title recognised his real-world accomplishments at the time.

Which band walked off a 1999 co-headlining tour with Marilyn Manson after only nine of thirty-seven planned dates?

Hole quit amid public insults and a dispute over money, having unknowingly paid most of the other act's production costs. The remaining dates carried on under a new name.

Which 1998 Marilyn Manson single earned a Grammy nomination and won an MTV award for Best Cinematography?

The Dope Show was up for Best Hard Rock Performance at the 41st Grammy Awards, and its video also won two prizes at the 1998 Billboard Music Video Awards.

Marilyn Manson often voiced his own clay puppet on which MTV series, becoming its unofficial champion and mascot?

Celebrity Deathmatch also got an original song from him, Astonishing Panorama of the Endtimes, for its soundtrack album.

Marilyn Manson co-wrote the theme, Cupid Carries a Gun, for which supernatural horror series and later joined its cast?

Salem first aired a 51-second cut of the song as its theme in 2014, before the full track appeared on The Pale Emperor. In the third season he played barber Thomas Dinley.

Marilyn Manson and Marco Beltrami composed the score for which horror film adapted from a Capcom video game?

Resident Evil arrived in 2002, the year he also sang Redeemer, a song written by Jonathan Davis, on the soundtrack of Queen of the Damned.

Which founding Marilyn Manson guitarist, born Scott Putesky, left the band midway through recording the second album?

Daisy Berkowitz composed most of the early music while the singer wrote the lyrics. He later sued over unpaid royalties, and the case was settled out of court.

Which longtime Marilyn Manson drummer, born Kenneth Wilson, fractured his skull falling off his drum riser in Germany?

Ginger Fish also broke his wrist and cheekbone in the fall at an awards ceremony, and a former Nine Inch Nails drummer filled in. He stayed with the band until resigning in 2011.

Which country musician, the son of an outlaw country legend, co-produced Marilyn Manson's 2020 album We Are Chaos?

Shooter Jennings, whose parents are Waylon Jennings and Jessi Colter, met the singer in 2013 through the band's bassist. The pair produced the record together.

Which French fashion designer made many of the costumes for Marilyn Manson's 2003 Grotesk Burlesk Tour?

Jean Paul Gaultier, who had created Madonna's cone bra for her 1990 tour, began working with the singer in this period.

After leaving Interscope, Marilyn Manson released Born Villain in 2012 through which British independent label?

Cooking Vinyl agreed to split profits equally with the band once its marketing and distribution costs were recouped. The album came out jointly with the singer's own imprint, Hell, etc.

Which composer of the 300 and Guardians of the Galaxy film scores produced Marilyn Manson's 2015 album The Pale Emperor?

Tyler Bates also became the band's lead guitarist, and went on to produce the follow-up, Heaven Upside Down.

Which music writer, later author of The Game, co-wrote Marilyn Manson's memoir The Long Hard Road Out of Hell?

Neil Strauss co-authored the 1998 memoir, then did the same three years later for Mötley Crüe's The Dirt.

Which singer first recorded I Put a Spell on You in 1956, decades before Marilyn Manson covered it on an EP?

Screamin' Jay Hawkins built a stage act around the song, wearing a long cape and rising out of a coffin amid smoke and fog.

Marilyn Manson voiced Edgar, an ancient and powerful Grey alien, in which science-fiction action video game?

Area 51 cast him opposite David Duchovny, who voiced the hero Ethan Cole. Edgar is the lone survivor of a crashed craft, held captive by the US military.

Which actor directed the short film Born Villain for Marilyn Manson after the two became friends at a Kills concert?

Shia LaBeouf made the horror short as a promotional trailer for the 2012 album, and the pair also put out a limited-edition book called Campaign.