“The Beautiful People” by Marilyn Manson

• Genre: Alternative Metal
• Single Release Date: September 1996
• Album: “Antichrist Superstar“

Although I’ve been a fan of rock and metal music since my early teens I’ve never really clicked with Marilyn Manson. Then I heard this track and it quickly became one of my favourites. That may be as much to do with how I first heard it as the song itself…

One of my favourite TV shows is Stargate and especially the Stargate Atlantis series. S5:E19 “Vegas” is set in an alternative universe where a wraith is living incognito on Earth and being hunted by the alternative version of John Sheppard. During one scene the wraith disguises himself as human and heads out into the city. There is lots of other great music in that episode but for some reason this particular track caught and held my attention.

I particularly like the following lines, for some reason they really resonate with me…

You can’t see the forest for the trees

And you can’t smell your own shit on your knees

Lyrics:

And I don’t want you and I don’t need you
Don’t bother to resist, or I’ll beat you
It’s not your fault that you’re always wrong
The weak ones are there to justify the strong

The beautiful people, the beautiful people
It’s all relative to the size of your steeple
You can’t see the forest for the trees
And you can’t smell your own shit on your knees

There’s no time to discriminate,
Hate every motherfucker
That’s in your way

Hey you, what do you see?
Something beautiful or something free?
Hey you, are you gonna to be mean?
You live with apes man, it’s hard to be clean

The worms will live in every host
It’s hard to pick which one they hate the most

The horrible people, the horrible people
It’s all anatomic as the size of your steeple
Capitalism has made it this way,
Old-fashioned fascism will take it away

Hey you, what do you see?
Something beautiful or something free?
Hey you, are you gonna to be mean?
You live with apes man, it’s hard to be clean

There’s no time to discriminate,
Hate every motherfucker
That’s in your way

The beautiful people
The beautiful people (ah) [4x]

[2x]
Hey you, what do you see?
Something beautiful or something free?
Hey you, are you gonna to be mean?
You live with apes man, it’s hard to be clean

The beautiful people [8x]

Header image from 8Tracks.com