Then: I'm slightly ashamed to admit it, but I was a huge Marilyn Manson fan for a while. I went and saw him live in 1998, the show at the Great Western Forum where he twisted his ankle and stopped the show after 6 songs, I dubbed my own tapes with all the tracks from The Spooky Kids, the original incarnation of the group. I lost interest around the new millennium, but Marilyn's first three albums were huge for me for a time.
Now: After giving this another spin, I'm surprised that Trent Reznor didn't produce more guitar-oriented rock albums, because he's really quite good at it. The production on Portrait is crystal-clean, the bass and guitar are big and meaty, and it's an anomaly in both Reznor and Manson's respective oeuvre that was never really visited again; both band and producer abandoned guitar rock for the more well-known industrial of "Closer" and "The Beautiful People" pretty soon after. Marilyn displays a humor on this first album that he pretty much gave up on after this as well; everything from Antichrist Superstar on is dour and humorless, whereas buried among the swearing and purposely shocking turns of phrase on Portrait, he allows himself to have a little fun. If you just want a good beefy mid '90s slice of rock, you could do worse than Portrait of an American Family. Way, way worse.
Honestly there's more fun and creativity to be found in Portrait's liner notes than in everything onwards from Holy Wood.
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