Marilyn Manson shared with the audience a new single from The Pale Emperor, his upcoming album. ‘’Cupid Carries a Gun’’ is the title of the third track made known to the wide public belonging to the soon-to be released album. The Pale Emperor is the ninth studio album of the artist and is expected to be released in less than two weeks, on 20 January 2015, through Hell, etc.
”Cupid Carries a Gun” is the ninth and the last but one single on Marilyn Manson’s upcoming album. The music of the 4:59 minutes track was co-written and produced by Tyler Bates, who apart from working with Marilyn Manson for his latest album, he also signed a film score album for James Gunn’s Guardians of the Galaxy. In that sense, the position of ”Cupid Carries a Gun” is a privileged one, as the track is also included into another project of Tyler Bates, which will most definitely bring Marilyn Manson fans and no-fans closer. The work at the album The Pale Emperor overlapped with the release of a 2014 horror-drama television series, Salem. The setting is the gloomy 17th century Massachusetts and proposes to portray the grotesque and dark atmosphere of the famous ‘’witch trials’’.
Tyler Bates’ composing the score of Salem made it possible for Manson’s Cupid to enter the world of the television series, as bits were used as the opening credits in the first season. ”Cupid Carries a Gun” debuted in the second episode of the season, entitled The Stone Child and which aired on 27 April 2014. The Hollywood Reporter shared the vision of Marilyn Manson upon the collaboration with the witch hunt based TV Series and the artist proved to be quite enthusiastic about the project: “The song ‘Cupid Carries a Gun’ was the last track we just finished for my new album. The occult and witchcraft [are] so often used in cinema with a heinous disregard for even researching its origins. However, I liked the themes of Salem. It looks at the witch trials without being cliché like most modern films.”
As for the opinion of Tyler Bates and the collaboration with Marilyn Manson, he then confessed: ‘’Manson and I wrote a draft of ‘Cupid Carries a Gun’ shortly before I began working on the score for Salem. A couple weeks later I saw the title sequence and the song immediately came to mind. I showed it to Manson for fun more than anything, and it inspired us to finish the song that night. The next day I played it for Brannon Braga and he said that ‘Cupid Carries a Gun’ was the perfect tone and attitude for the show’s main titles.”
Listen to Marilyn Manson’s ”Cupid Carries a Gun”: