Skip to main content

THE ARSONIST: Marilyn Manson and the Final Reckoning

There is a point in One Assassination Under God – Chapter 2 where the language of survival finally becomes the language of retaliation. “The Arsonist” is that point. The song is not simply about having survived an attempt to destroy you. It is about what happens afterward, when the person who has been burned decides that the fire did not finish him and that the scars it left behind have become part of his strength. Manson himself described the song as the moment when the narrative of the two chapters “crystallizes into a battle stance,” and, referring to the painting he created for it, said that the “burned scar tissue” had formed into armor. That description gets very close to the heart of the song. The fire has not disappeared. It has changed him. The title is important because Manson does not call the song The Survivor or The Victim . He calls it "The Arsonist." An arsonist deliberately starts a fire, and this changes the entire perspective of the song. The speaker is no...

Marilyn Manson Returns To His Hometown in Canton, Ohio


After a series of amazing festival shows in the month of August that brought Marilyn Manson to places like Mexico, Turkey and Kazakhstan, with enthusiastic and record-breaking crowds, the band finally resumed their One Assassination Under God Tour at the sold-out House of Blues in Cleveland, Ohio on Tuesday September 16, 2025. This Fall North American tour will continue until October 5th in Sacramento, California.

The significance of Marilyn Manson kicking off this leg of the tour in Cleveland, Ohio is that this marks a return of Marilyn Manson to his native area, having been born and raised in nearby Canton, Ohio. Manson hasn’t performed in Cleveland since a 2018 show at Blossom Music Center during his “Twins of Evil: The Second Coming” co-headlining tour with Rob Zombie. Notable also is that Cleveland is the birthplace of Rock and Roll.


The difference between 2018 and 2025 is that now Marilyn Manson is married and decided on September 15th, ahead of his September 16th concert, to show his bride Lindsay the places where he grew up in Canton. She even captured in photographs a few significant moments which Manson shared in his Instastories. The first photo was taken of Manson standing in front of his childhood home, while the second shows him sitting on the steps of Heritage Christian School, which he attended from first to tenth grade.


The next day Marilyn Manson performed to a sold-out show in Cleveland's House of Blues, where the following hits made it on the setlist:

Nod If You Understand
Disposable Teens
Angel With the Scabbed Wings
Great Big White World
Sacrilegious
This Is the New Shit
The Nobodies
Tourniquet
mOBSCENE
Long Hard Road Out of Hell
The Dope Show
As Sick as the Secrets Within
Sweet Dreams 
The Beautiful People

Encore 1:
One Assassination Under God
The Love Song

Encore 2:
Coma White