A Brief History Of Marilyn Manson And His Famous Friends

With a month until his U.S. tour starts, and with the follow-up to 2017’s Heaven Upside Down apparently in the can already, it would seem that Marilyn Manson is at something of a loose end. This weekend, The God Of Fuck amused himself at the iHeartRadio Wango Tango concert in California by getting his photo with Taylor Swift and Joe Jonas.

But, as a fashionable celebrity mover and shaker – not to mention an absolute scream – our boy has loads of celebrity mates. We’ve all seen him hanging out with Rob Halford, Alice Cooper, Johnny Depp, Steven Tyler and other normal rock star buds, but that’s just the thin end of Manson’s bromances…

There’s something ever so sweet about this. It sort of looks like a representation of darkness and light: TaySway the colourful, smiling picture of happiness; Manson the negative-image opposite. She who is famously far too nice to actually be real. He who is actually far more of a laugh than your mum would like to believe. It’s actually quite cute, a sort of Lisa Simpson/Nelson Muntz innocent love. Bonus points for getting everyone talking about this rather than the Easter eggs for a new album Swifto apparently dropped into her show. LOL.

What, honestly, do you think the conversation around Manson’s other picture from the weekend went like? Credit where it’s due, that’s a more banter caption on Joe Jonas’ tweet than you’d expect from him, but this meeting at LA’s hilariously-titled Wango Tango radio fest is almost certainly not the start of a lasting, WhatsApp group-storming bromance between him, Mazza and Ryan Seacrest.

It could have been such a beautiful friendship. After his transformation from irritating little choirboy into a pot-smoking, drag-racing, photographer beefing gobshite, the boy Bieber’s track record had him perfectly teed-up to be Manson’s bezzie. If only he hadn’t ripped off a Manson merch idea and claimed he’d made The God Of Fuck “relevant again”. Manson, for his part, said there was no beef, but that didn’t stop him gloating that he’d been awarded proceeds from the merch with no contest, and saying Beebz had “the mind of a squirrel”. Shame.

Now we’re talking: Manson and ‘Spooky’ Mulder. Google Images has a few treats if you search for this combo, all of them pointing to the pair having a ruddy good time together. The bromance began on the set of Californication, when Manson played a friend of Tim Minchin’s character. Aww.

It was only a matter of time, wasn’t it? Despite saying in 2012 that he has “a hard time listening to her music”, friendship blossomed to the point where the God Of Fuck and Pokerface herself worked together on a remix of her track, LoveGame. And, it should be noted, only one of these artists has ever properly freaked out guests at the MTV Video Music Awards by turning up in a dress made of meat. Your move, Manson…

Does anyone else think that Barry Manilow is a secret bantersaurus? Katy Perry: yeah, you can imagine her being a riot and hanging out with Manson, but this meeting of minds does raise the question of whether Baz is as boring as he seems. Look at that face: it’s seen things. Also, wearing all-black = team Manson.

It’s sad to think that, had time run slightly differently, Manson could well have turned up on The Fresh Prince Of Bel-Air. Not sure how, but it would. Will Smith likes him, anyway. Although, two questions here: 1) Will, what the fuck is that sweater? 2) Is your sweater the reason Brian Blessed behind you has got such an angry eye?

As arty, intelligent, slightly odd men, it’s unsurprising that Manson and REM frontman Michael Stipe’s paths have crossed. How fortuitous here, because Stipe looks like he’s wandered off from his school trip and Mazza, Twiggy and Courtney Love are helping him out.

Manson once noted that the first time he met Snoop Dogg, the rap lord was so stoned his eyes were barely open. Imagine. Our. Surprise. Understandably, in such company it would be rude not to as well. Thus, we have weed-Manson.

Here we find our hero horsing around with Quentin Tarantino at a party for the release of the 2009 Tilda Swinton flick I Am Love. We pitch this as being the point of the evening where the drinks have landed, but wearing a suit hasn’t made you go all hot-face just yet. A lovely time.

This is rather nice, this one. You can imagine Nigella and Manson getting on, but with a weird balance of power where she’s completely impervious to his attempts to shock her, can’t you? And, in this situation on The Graham Norton Show in 2007, that’s basically what happened. In fact, Norton’s smutty-yet-mum-friendly-performance was one of the few times we’ve ever seen Manson struggle to get the upper hand in an interview. Sadly, this lovely meeting of minds hasn’t happened since. Change that, TV people.

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