What did Marylin Manson say about capitalism? He was friends with Anton LaVey...

Let's examine two close friends (or, rather, to people that used to be close friends).

Manson and Trent Reznor.
Manson just does shit to piss people off and be controversial (i'm sure i'm not shocking anyone here with such a revelation) he's anti-things just for the sake of it.
Trent is stuck in a '90 liberal mostly environmentalist mindset "let's save the planet bad people are bad", he recently worked with Ross on scoring (in a, to be honest, rather beautiful way, check out "A Minute To Breathe from the OST) a piece of liberal propaganda called "Before the Flood".

Ultimately, they're both liberals that don't understand much about politics.
This is common for a lot of musicians and shouldn't really shock you in any way.
I respect Manson a little more because i think he sorta knows he's a retarded kid mentally and his dabbling in politics and such has always been a "side thing".
I love Trent more but also consider him the dumbest of the two, because he LEGITIMATELY things he's politically informed and that trough his music he's making a grand political statement (most notably back in the day with his Year Zero album), when in reality even your average liberal will listen to his shit and think "this is dumb and cheesy" and just focus on the music itself.

He's a self-proclaimed fascist.

Trent might be lurking watch out.

No, satanism is basically a "religious" version of individualism.
But it inherently works within the limits and benefits of capitalism, due to it's nature it can't break free of it.
Basically satanism is a bunch of spooked neonate Stirnerfags that are either genuinely religious, or (if they're actually informed on the history of satamism itself) just use religious symbols and rituals as one big parody of religious dogma.

But yeah, in short, it's useless.

He's a contrarian, that's all he is.

C'mon, it reads like something off some kid's myspace.
Stop reading too much into half the shit he says.

Trent used to be very involved with the internet NIN fandom scene and internet communities in general, he was really ahead of the curve for a long time.

But he stopped when he realized that people could call him out on his pseudointellectual shit and expose that he's really nowhere as smart (or informed) as he thinks he is.
Also he has notoriously a bad temper and is easily affected by the judgment of others, so as the internet became more toxic and volatile, he flat out couldn't handle it anymore.

These days he pumps iron, fucks his wife, and seems like a happier person in general.
But yeah as far as Holla Forums is concerned he has pretty much fully embraced being porky and any shred of anti estabilishment fire inside him has long died out, it's all pretend by now.

I remember reading an article he wrote in defense of Waffles and that other torrent site with a pig name I cant remember. The sites that were precursors to what.cd. He said losing those was like the internet equivalent of losing the library of Alexandria. I thought it was a pretty extreme statement but the defense of torrent sites and an artist truly understanding their use as a way for people to hear shit they really wouldn't hear otherwise or get elsewhere was refreshing.

I don't really no much about his views on things aside from that as i was never much of a NIN fan.

He personally compiled a series of "collections" of NIN tracks, shit like NIN Quiet collection or something like that, and then he uploaded them TPB back in the day, under a pseudonym.
He also never personally did anything to shut down the free sharing of his music by pirates (but some of the companies and labels he worked with, did).

He used to be pretty based on these things.
But i think right now he just realizes there's very little money to be made by selling albums, compared to selling physical vinyls to collectors and hipsters, and most importantly selling tickets to live shows.
It's not that he's about "freedom" anymore, he just doesn't care that much and understands that the real money is made elsewhere, a bunch of big musicians understood this too, Radiohead, to name one.

Hell even small musicians understand it.
Just go on Bandcamp and look up small artists, 8 times out of 10 they'll just use the "pay what you want" method where you can just pay $0 and get it for free, incentivizing people to buy physical vinyls, even cassette tapes in some cases, and tons of other merch, they understand that fixating on selling the music itself isn't gonna make them a big profit anymore.

*know damn me again.

You know every year I force myself to watch "award shows" for music just to see if there are any good mainstream artists I missed and each year that end of the music business seems more and more depressing. Almost no rock makes it to the mainstream anymore, only the most mindless rap and pop is just bland beyond belief. There are some tolerable and genuinely good artists who do make it still, but they're the exception and not the rule. I'd like to think it's just me getting older and out of touch, but there is a lot of new music I like elsewhere it just never seems to make it on television or the radio.

A lot of artists directly market themselves as you say, but there is just so much shit that exists outside of the mainstream that I wonder how any of them cultivates a fanbase that cares enough or is big enough through inertia to really sustain artists anymore. Live shows can only take you so far financially and even with those you need asses in seats and it's just hard for me to imagine a post-chill wave artist with vapor wave influences and cloud rap vocals getting enough people in their niche to matter.

Yeah it's an interesting time for music in general.
If someone just knows the mainstream scene he might think this is one of the worst and less interesting historical period for music, because big artists that rely on traditional record sales (or that are big enough where those sales even matter by sheer numbers of listeners all around the world), are very limited in numbers.

But actually once you dig under the surface this is probably THE most diverse period we've ever had in terms of overwhelming amounts of artists and different musical genres and subgenres, once you break past the pleb barrier an entire universe of easy to reach (and often free to listen to) artists opens up to you.

But just as you said, it's not easy making a living off this if you're small, even relying on selling merch and organizing live shows.
For every small artist that gets exposure trough his modest bandcamp and soundcloud and eventually manages to make a couple of live shows and sell of merch, there's hundreds of, perhaps even objectively more talented, musicians that never manage to get past that initial "exposure" phase.
I really can't decide if the current situation is a good or a bad thing for music.
We have an immense selection, but also tons of musicians that will never get paid, and use the money to explore and refine their craft.

I remember saying something very similar to this to my fam at Thanksgiving. That basically through the internet there is revivals for all previous forms of music and a ton of new "waves" and genres all at the same time. Mixes of all this stuff and everything in between. It was hard for my parent's, aunt's, uncles and shit to understand that because all they see is the niche stuff they like + the mainstream and through that lens things look pretty shallow now.

I think a lot of record companies are going to die off in the interim period and then the smart ones are going to realize the way they can entice artists is by becoming advertisers/bean counters for them. They basically will say "Let us do the business side and you guys worry about the fun stuff." The problem is their mindset is still in the old model where their money and appeal was in distribution rather than in promotion where they can actually help new artists rise above the crowd. I don't think this is good for artists and I'd rather record companies just die for good to be honest but this is what I see as "their" best strategy for survival.

I think it's a good time for music and a lot of good things are being done, it just feels worse because we are conditioned to think of the history of music as being broad trends and movements rather than the series of small ones we have now. Or maybe it really just does suck and Tay Swift is the Fukuyama end point in the history of music.

I just typed "Marylin Manson" and "capitalism" on youtube and got a small clip from an interview but im not sure what one. The idiot cutting the clip cut him off mid sentence. His only gripe mentioned in this clip was about consumerism killing the self
youtube.com/watch?v=2YLgkPlLJd4

You left out how Trent left his record label so he could stop newer releases being cracked down on for copyright infringement. At least that's what i heard was the reason for him starting his own record.

I'm not entirely sure about the history between Trent and the various labels, it's a bit confusing.

All i know is that Trent and John Malm created a record label called "Nothing Records", but it was a label still under Interscope Records.
Trent found out that John was cheating him on the dosh somehow, fucking him over for a total of 2 million dollars.
He sued him, won the cause, got around 3 million back.

Currently Trent uses another label he also founded, called "The Null Corporation" that isn't affiliated with any other company, if i'm not mistaken.
All his new releases are under that label.

lol no, LaVey charged people "member's fees" to be in his sekrit club.

They still charge I think and also sue anyone who uses their copyrighted pentagram lol

Anton LaVey was Jewish, but yeah its common for theistic satanists to lean that way, but not all of them do, its not incompatible with leftism either.

oink.cd if I remember right.
Well yeah, he said that he actually downloaded a lot of his samples because just torrenting them was easier than locate the disc and go fetch it (or pay someone to fetch it). If that's his take, I believe he'll probably went with the buy music on the internet shit.