55. Marylin Manson - 'We Are Chaos'

Yes, you are reading this right. Not only is there are a Marylin Manson album on this list, but it is higher than my beloved Springsteen. I have been very honest in the past that I have never got Brian Warner and his ego driven goth-industrial horror show. He emerged at a time when I was busy being an Indie-Kid and on my return to Metal in the early noughties, he seemed to me little more than a Poundland Alice Cooper with authority issues. Over the year’s various lacklustre encounters at various festivals did nothing to redeem his reputation in my eyes. Until now.  

“We are Chaos” is excellent. It is to all intent and purpose a Bowie album but made by someone else. It is self-aware and inward looking, like he has realised that his biggest enemy isn’t the religion or the state, but himself. For someone that I considered to be little more than a caricature, this is a remarkably emotionally literate record.  

Musically it is sparse and sparing, direct and unwavering. Each of the ten tracks serves a purpose, there is no filler or weak links here. Instead it uses every moment of its relatively short, 42-minute running time to move the narrative forward. After bloated release after bloated release, Manson seems to have decided to strip away all the unnecessary trickery and create an album that allows his own voice to be heard. It will take a lot for me to ever embrace being an actual fan of Marilyn Manson, but with ten personal soulful tracks he most definitely confounded my expectations.