The self-proclaimed "Beautiful Monsters" set sail as an industrial-size test to see if a titanic mod-rock tour could still float.  Courtney Love and Marilyn Manson arrived married not so much by their recent swivels glamward but by their interest in bigness, in leaping from subcult to pop massive (a desire their recent sales betray in varying degrees).  In the search for an opening-night audience not already see-through faded, super-jaded, the rustic Northwest must have seemed like a perfect location: student-heavy, far from they cynical media capitols, and guaranteed to draw some fire from the righteous.

Christian zealots chanting outside?  Check.  Extra security?  Check.  Dolled-up fans and excitement in the air?  Check and check.  But when it became apparent the platinum provocateurs didn't sell out the mid-size arena, questions arose: Are the kids all right?  But perhaps more important, when had the Rock Star and the Weirdo lost their grip on the public imagination?

For all the improvements in their songcraft, and the matching makeovers - punk to pop, Goth to glam - the aesthetics of both artists still date to a moment when alt.culture was an unchallenged world unto itself.  Their unreconstructed stances may be a vision thing, but the reluctance of both to look the hip-hop nation in the eye is a losing proposition that rock's current cut-up kings - Korn, Limp Bizkit, even the wigga-mocking Offspring - have seen through.  But if Courtney and Marilyn dreamed of escaping that truth in this white open space, they slept on the real.  Even before Hole hit the stage, someone was shouting "C'mon, Courtney - get at us dog!"  When Manson encored four hours later with Patti Smith's "Rock n' Roll Nigger," it seemed more than ever like wishful thinking.  He's tried hard to make shaking your ass and being persecuted look cool - as if that job hadn't been taken over by hip-hop.
 
A strange brew of Queen of the Universe and prodigal daughter, Courtney Love wandered onstage in the world's ugliest leather culottes and a top guaranteed to drop before the night was through.  Guitarist Eric Erlandson, bassist Melissa Auf der Maur, and new drummer Samantha Maloney went for more of an I'm-cool-too-but-don't-take-your-eyes-off-the-star vibe.  Then Courtney tried to be alt things to alt people.  "Hi," she said.  "We're Fugazi.  No, we're Sisters of Mercy.  Y'know what band we really are?  Guns N' Roses.  We're Mudhoney, we're fucking Bikini Kill, we're everything rolled into one."

The crowd might've settled for Hole, the one they knew from records, working a set list fiercer and prettier than any around.  But the tunes would've rocked harder if you could hear them.  Hole's traditionally crappy sound was worse than ever, a maelstrom of indistinct white noise.  If Hole still wanted to be a punk band, their audio chaos would be fine, but for the newer, sparklier Hole, it was a disaster.  Rock candy like "Heaven Tonight" and "Awful" simply dissolved in the storm.  Even set-closer "Celebrity Skin" needed a full dose of just that from Ms. Love to get the crowd going.

Inevitably it was the punkier gestures that came off, like Love's familiar old howl on "Pretty On The Inside" and "Violet".  As she wound down "Doll Parts", wailing through the rough mix like a teapot in a tempest, she even persuaded us to ache like she ached, if only for a minute.  But for every moment of clarity, there was a dive right back into confusion: strobing freakily between haranguing and pandering to the audience; baffling her mates with a cappella bits of "Suzanne" and "Pretty Fly (For A White Guy)"; purring and snarling and finally exiting in tears during the encore "Northern Star."  Maybe such incoherence was what Courtney meant when she proclaimed this an "anti-show".  She didn't hesitate to let us know that she was all about coming "from the heart", and that the showwoman of the evening was actually "that bitch Marilyn."

And the bitch did not disappoint.  There was more big-top joie de performance in the first minute of Marilyn Manson's spectacle than in Hole's entire set.  Delivered onto the stage by a huge crucifix composed of video monitors, and looking quite fab in a sheer black bodysuit and boa, he launched int oa 15-song set that drove with ruthless precision, like it was choreographed by a fascist accountant.  Who else could make stilt-walking seem evil, and sell a sleeveless, sparkle-blue Evel Knieval outfit as futuristic space-glam?  Old-school rock touches abounded, from fireworks to just plain fires.  In stagecraft and sound quality - in everything but the songs themselves - Manson & Co owned the evening.

For the dozens who came for the music, the band drew heavily on 1998's Mechanical Animals, though it did not neglect such earlier hits as "Antichrist Superstar" and "The Beautiful People".  The cover of Eurythmics' "Sweet Dreams" was more nightmarishly over the top in concert than on record; Manson's transmutation of New Wave decadence into Industrial creepiness defines his musical intelligence.  For the thousands who came for the schtick, Manson offered up his dopey rants and showy ass, encouraging the crowd to flip him the finger and chant, "We hate Courtney Love, we love hate."  But it all seemed like sweetly old-fashioned rock gesturing, far from true transgression.  Even while spastically heil-ing during "Antichrist", you just wanted to hold him and whisper "achtung, baby."

Still, the crowd clearly lived for the moments when the shock and the rock came together.  After his "Jesus invented pop, coke, and acid" soliloquy drew its whoops from the tripping 'billies, he blasted out a funkdafied version of "I Don't Like The Drugs (But The Drugs Like Me)."  As a giant DRUGS marquee flashed away, he even hauled out a faux-gospel singer to close the deal - his own tiny nod to the sounds of blackness.

As the Beautiful Monsters packed up and headed for the next town, one suspected that, even if they never figure out what time it is, the two stars will realize they're each other through the looking glass: Courtney wants to be a Rock Star but she's just a Weirdo, breaking up and making up with the crowd every few seconds.  And Marilyn wants nothing but to be a Weirdo, transgressive and freaky.  In the end, though, hitting marks and striking poses like a pro, he's just a Rock Star.
 
 
 

Spin Magazine, May 1999