Revision as of 00:33, 16 July 2011

This article is about the album. For the tour, see Portrait of an American Family (tour).

Portrait of an American Family
Studio album by Marilyn Manson
Released	July 19, 1994
Recorded	August–December 1993 at Criteria Studios in Miami, Florida, Record Plant Studios in Los Angeles, California, The Village Recorder and Pig
Genre	Alternative metal, heavy metal, industrial metal
Length	61:05
Label	Nothing, Interscope
Producer	Marilyn Manson, Trent Reznor
Professional reviews
Allmusic Template:Rating 3.5 link
Marilyn Manson chronology
The Manson Family Album (N/A) Portrait of an American Family (1994) Smells Like Children (1995)

Portrait of an American Family is the debut full-length studio album by American rock band Marilyn Manson. It was released on July 19, 1994 in the US through Nothing and Interscope Records. It was produced by the band's frontman and Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails. The album was initially known as The Manson Family Album—a direct reference to serial killer Charles Manson's own band—but was retitled prior to release.

It is the first and only Marilyn Manson studio album that bassist Gidget Gein plays on. Gein was fired from the band after its production following a very public and destructive heroin addiction and Twiggy Ramirez, the band's groupie and friend of Gein and Manson, was put as a temporary replacement while Gein got clean and sober. He eventually took over Gein's place, becoming a Gein clone. Contrary to popular belief, Ramirez did not play bass on the album. Though Sara Lee Lucas was the featured drummer on the album, Nine Inch Nails live keyboardist Charlie Clouser used a drum machine to replace the work Lucas did. Daisy Berkowitz helped compose music for all of the songs except "Prelude (The Family Trip)" and "Sweet Tooth."

The album has sold over 2.5 million copies worldwide and was certified Gold on May 29, 2003 by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) for shipments of over 500,000 copies in the United States.^[1] It spawned three singles ("Get Your Gunn", "Lunchbox" and "Dope Hat").

In late 2009, it was re-released by Interscope and sold through Hot Topic stores as a special edition boxset combination of a T-shirt bearing the album artwork and colored vinyl 2xLP record of the album. The color of the disc is green, matching most of the bands fonts at the time of the albums original 1994 release, however this reissue featured some imagery from The High End of Low on its label, much to the dismay of fans.^[2]

Background

The Manson Family Album

Main article: The Manson Family Album

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Recording sessions for its national debut, Portrait of an American Family, began in July 1993. Working with producer Roli Mosimann at Criteria Studios in Miami, Florida,^[3] the band recorded a selection of new songs along with reworked material from their Spooky Kids repertoire and, by the end of Autumn 1993, had completed the first version of their debut, a full album's worth of material collectively known as The Manson Family Album.^[4] At the time, "Snake Eyes and Sissies" was on track to be the band's first single, with a single edit having already been made. However the band was simply not satisfied with the output of these recording sessions and shelved the album for a short time.^[5]

Within a few months, the band would convince rising star Trent Reznor to produce the album instead.^[6] The abrasive sonic "rawness" that Mosimann's production had brought to such groups as Swans had failed to materialize on The Manson Family Album; Reznor and all the band's members thought it "sucked", and was poorly representative of Marilyn Manson's dynamic live performances.^[3][7] In October 1993, Reznor agreed to fully commit to the project, taking them and their tapes to various studios in Los Angeles. With the help of Reznor and numerous live members of his band, Nine Inch Nails, Marilyn Manson re-recorded and reworked their old material until they were satisfied and released it under the name Portrait of an American Family.^[8] "Snake Eyes and Sissies" would never see a single release and in the album's credits Mosimann is credited as an engineer with no mention of his production work.

Years later, former guitarist Daisy Berkowitz was asked about these original recordings in an interview and gave the interviewer a cassette tape featuring the unused recordings. The interviewer then released them to the Internet where they are now widely available, usually labeled as Portrait of an American Family (Pre-Reznor Mix) or Portrait of an American Family Demos.

Cultural references

The Portrait of an American Family album has an especially wide array of American cultural references. The words "Go on and smile, you cunt" at the beginning of "Cake and Sodomy" are spoken by Marlon Brando in the film Last Tango in Paris. In the song "Dogma", there is a sample from the John Waters film Pink Flamingos, when Mink Stole's character says "Burn, you fucker!" before setting fire to a trailer. Although the clip from Desperate Living is credited in the liner notes, this audio clip is not. Furthermore, John Waters was thanked in the liner notes. The phrase "We're gonna ride to the Abbey of Thelema" in the song "Misery Machine" is a reference to Aleister Crowley's Abbey of Thelema, which was used as the Headquarters from which the doctrines of Thelema would be spread throughout the world.

The track "My Monkey" borrows certain lyrics from a Charles Manson song called "Mechanical Man;" the lyrics of "My Monkey" are credited simply to "Manson". At 02:29 of "Get Your Gunn", there is a sample of a crowd murmuring and a gun shot. This is the audio from the press conference in which Budd Dwyer committed suicide in front of an audience. The words to "Prelude (The Family Trip)" come from Roald Dahl's book Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Also, the printing of Marilyn Manson on various promos during this time and on the remix album Smells Like Children resemble the printing of the title to the 1971 film version of the novel.

"Killing is killing, whether done for duty, profit or fun" is a quote by Richard Ramirez that is an audio clip at the start of "Snake Eyes and Sissies". "Organ Grinder" features the sample "Lollipops for the kiddie winkies," spoken by the Child Catcher from the movie Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. At the start of "Cyclops" there is a very slowed down and distorted sample of the preacher from Poltergeist II singing "God Is In His Holy Temple". "Dope Hat" contains the samples "the great Hoodoo!" and "Prepare to meet your doom" taken from the Sid and Marty Krofft cult TV show Lidsville. These words are spoken by the actor Charles Nelson Reilly. "Lunchbox" contains the sample "I bring you fire!" from the song "Fire" by The Crazy World of Arthur Brown. "Misery Machine" contains a sample from "Beep Beep" by The Playmates. "Wrapped in Plastic" is influenced by Twin Peaks, referencing the image of character Laura Palmer wrapped in plastic, which was one of the show's most enduring images. It also featured the distorted words "Hallelujah" and "Meanwhile" from the Twin Peaks scene in the Black Lodge. This is followed by the distinctive scream of Laura Palmer.

In Marilyn Manson book, The Long Hard Road Out of Hell, he describes that Wrapped In Plastic is a song that's about his past at his grandfather's basement and the scream in the end of the song is Manson's voice distorted and backwards. The family jams version of the song gives the listener better detail of this fact.

Track listing

1. "Prelude (The Family Trip)" – 1:20

2. "Cake and Sodomy" – 3:46

3. "Lunchbox" – 4:32

4. "Organ Grinder" – 4:22

5. "Cyclops" – 3:32

6. "Dope Hat" – 4:21

7. "Get Your Gunn" – 3:18

8. "Wrapped in Plastic" – 5:35

9. "Dogma" – 3:22

10. "Sweet Tooth" – 5:03

11. "Snake Eyes and Sissies" – 4:07

12. "My Monkey" – 4:31

13. "Misery Machine" – 13:11

Bonus tracks

14. "Down in the Park" (Argentina bonus track) – 5:00

15. "Brown Bag" (Argentina bonus track) – 6:19

Album credits

Cover gallery

Charts and certifications

Album charts

Singles

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Trivia

• 
  "Snake Eyes and Sissies" was originally planned as the lead single but never released; "Get Your Gunn" was released instead. It also was originally 5:09, and had extra lyrics.
• Marilyn Manson created the clay sculpture on the cover of the album.
• Manson had initially wanted to put a nude photo of himself as a child for the album artwork. The record company deemed it would be seen as child pornography, so Manson created the album artwork with the clay figures.
• Although there are technically no hidden tracks on the album, there is some additional audio a few seconds after the end of last track, "Misery Machine". The sample, "Go home to your mother! Doesn't she ever watch you!? Tell her this isn't some Communist day-care center! Tell your mother I hate her! Tell your mother I hate you!" is spoken by Mink Stole from the John Waters 1977 film "Desperate Living". After this, a telephone can be heard ringing very quietly for several minutes, which is then followed an irate answering machine message, presumably from a parent of a Manson fan.
• Bassist Gidget Gein was fired after the production of this album.
• Daisy Berkowitz helped compose music for all of the songs except "Prelude (The Family Trip)" and "Sweet Tooth".
• Roli Mosimann was the original producer of the album, however due to the direction the album was taking the band felt his production was not what they were looking for and Trent Reznor took over the producer role while Mossiman was credited as the engineer.
• The album's original title was The Manson Family Album.
• The song "Filth" was planned to be officially released on Portrait of an American Family but was replaced by "Wrapped in Plastic" instead, and this Reznor-produced version has never been officially released.
• The track "My Monkey" is different from the one on Big Black Bus.
• One of the release parties for the album was held in Fort Lauderdale, Florida on June 29th, 1994.
• One of the release parties for the album was held in Plantation, Florida on July 18th, 1994.
• In late 2009, Hot Topic stores began selling a combination set of a t-shirt baring the album artwork and colored vinyl of the album. The color of the vinyl is green, matching most fonts from the time.

Credits and personnel

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Marilyn Manson^[11]

• Mr. Manson – vocals, producer, brass, loops, artwork, adaptation, composer, logo (credited as "accusations, child manipulations, backwards masking, polaroids")
• Daisy Berkowitz – guitars, acoustic guitars, composer (credited as "psychoacoustical guitars")
• Madonna Wayne Gacy – calliope, hammond organ, saxophone, theremin, brass, overdubs, loops, composer, sound effects (credited as "hammond organ, theremin, saxophone, calliopenis, brass, babies, distorted muzette, loops")
• Sara Lee Lucas – drums, sound effects (credited as "hitting")
• Gidget Gein – bass, composer
• Twiggy Ramirez – "base tendencies" (an often misunderstood pun, which of course, would be different from the bass guitar)

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Production^[11]

• Trent Reznor – executive producer, digital editing, editing, pandora, programming, mixing, brass, guitar
• Robin Finck – synthesis, keyboards (uncredited on album, however Manson has confirmed his involvement)
• Roli Mosimann – engineer
• Sean Beavan – assistant, assistant producer, programming, digital editing, editing, mixing, brass
• Alan Moulder – assistant, assistant producer, engineer, mixing
• Charlie Clouser – drums, African drums, drum programming, digital editing, editing
• Chris Vrenna – percussion, programming, assistant engineer
• Tom Baker – mastering
• Chris Meyer – engineer
• Barry Goldberg – assistant, assistant engineer
• Brian Pollack – assistant, assistant engineer
• Brian Scheuble – assistant, assistant engineer
• Mark Gruber – assistant, assistant engineer
• Hope Nichols – saxophone, vocals
• Robert Pierce – vocals
• Robin Perine – photography
• Jeffrey Weiss – photography
• Gary Talpas – packaging
• Marc Freegard – mixing
• Wade Wright – mood lighting
• Albert Sgambati – tattoos
• Donovan Stringer – tattoos
• Frank Callari – management
• John Tovar – management
• Sioux Z. – publicity
• Melissa Romero – performance

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References

Footnotes

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Bibliography

• Manson, Marilyn; Strauss, Neil (February 14, 1998). The Long Hard Road Out of Hell. New York: HarperCollins division ReganBooks. ISBN 0-06-039258-4. 

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