Crossman 1

Marianne Crossman

Professor Vicki Stalbird

ENG 1201.523

10 October 2020

The Tainted Ways of Love

“Tainted Love” by Soft Cell and the remake by Marilyn Manson are songs with identical

lyrics and yet contain different meanings. Soft Cell creates an almost comical tale of cheating;

whereas Manson embraces his tainted love and has a grand time doing it. These music videos

were produced in separate eras and with two different audiences in mind. Soft Cell created their

version in 1981 to a world entering the pop stage. Musicians were experimenting with new

electronic sounds and music videos were a new thing adding a way to show what the lyrics

meant to the artists. Manson put out his in 2001 to a world, saturated with music videos. He had

to go with a shock factor to make people watch his video. These two songs contrast each other in

their styles and yet the message remains the same as does both singer's inability to getaway.

Soft Cell’s video takes place in a fantasy garden. We enter through the garden gate

following Ball, who is the main musician in the band, holding the hand of a child dressed in

Greco-Roman garb. We see Marc, the main singer, dressed as a Greco-Roman with very white

makeup on his face. Attired the same as the little girl implies a connection between the two of

them. Seated beside Marc’s; a posh British lady who attempts to feed and touch him. In the

background, stands a black man who fans them throughout the entire video and occasionally

makes a weird face. Marc proceeds to sing at the child with an angry expression and slamming
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down of fists on the table. The child just smiles throughout his tirade with an almost knowing

look on her face.

The video implies an affair has happened between the servant and Mrs. Almond and a

child of mixed color is the outcome. We sense this from the way Marc’s glances angrily at the

black man and then back at the child. Almond appears to sing at the girl the whole movie.

Perhaps his disgust with his wife makes him unable to look at her, so he takes it out on the child.

Meanwhile, the woman does not pay any attention to the child except to give her a few dirty

looks, as if the girl is nothing but an annoyance to her. Her focus is on getting Marc to look at or

acknowledge her. He never does, but he takes the child’s hand, drops it quickly, but then retakes

it with a smile, and gently guides her to a fish tank. He encourages her to put her hand in the fish

tank acting interested in her. The tank contains piranhas; thereby allowing us to see how much he

wishes for the child to be gone. The movie ends with him sitting on a swing with the black man

still in the background and his woman hovering over him. Bell exits the garden his job of

delivering the child to Almond is done.

Marilyn Manson's’ remake of “Tainted Love” was produced for Not Another Teenage

Movie, so the main cast from that movie is in his video. His video follows in the style of most of

his music products. It is loud, noisy and he makes an entrance you cannot miss. It begins at a

house party hosted by Chris Evans and Eric Olsen who are the popular jocks from the movie.

Marilyn and his entourage of goths show up and crash their party. The first action Manson takes

upon entering the house is to push Chris Evans out of the way thus showing he is now the main

player in this story. At his entrance, Jamie Pressly, who is the hot cheerleader, notices him and

there is an instant attraction. His people scatter throughout the house causing chaos and
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horrifying most of the teenagers there with their wild antics. They take over the music and turn

the party into a wild scene of pole, lap, and break dancing. Not forgetting steamy hot tub

sessions.

One woman merges with Manson’s group. Chyler Leigh is the typical nerdy girl in Not

Another Teenage Movie and just as in that she transforms from a nobody to a super hot chick.

Just this time she is a goth chick, who jumps in the hot tub with Manson. They head to a

bedroom which is a contrast from the rest of the music video. The bedroom's color scheme is

pink, white, and red, the colors of a young girl's room, but the entire movie has been shades of

black. There are stuff animals on the bed, albeit life-size ones. This is the room of a young girl

and Manson enters it and the tainting of the girl is complete. As Manson is on the bed with his

bunny dancers he sings “I love you though you hurt me so” (Manson). He is not being hurt;

hence we know it is satire. Manson states “the video for Tainted Love couldn't be any more

sarcastic” (1). The words are saying one thing, but the acts we see in his movie are showing us

another story. Pressly finally makes it into the bedroom and Mason has vanished as if his

mission is done.

Soft Cell used comedic satire to tell a story while making you laugh and feel sorry for

him at the same time. He puts on a show of a besotted fool who is trying to find a way out.

Manson implied that while involved in a tainted relationship; he is not too troubled by it.

Comedy is an excellent way of bringing a point across and it can be used darkly, but still be

funny. Both had similarities in their musical styles, which one could miss if not paying attention.

Soft Cell’s music is all electronic, with synthesized sounds. Manson used electronics too but

made it a darker more rock version. Again, they seem to try for similar audiences in age, just not
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musical styles. Both are geared for an older audience, but because they have humor in them

young kids would probably watch them.

The lyrics tell us they both want to “run-away…from the pain that you drive into the

heart of me” (Manson). However, neither seems to an effort to getaway. That sums up toxic

relationships. We “toss and turn and can't sleep at night” (Soft Cell). There are tears, heartaches,

and yet we stay and cannot seem to leave this toxic person. How improved our lives could be if

we would just “pack our bags and go” (Soft Cell).

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Work Cited

Manson, M.“METEOR SHOWERS AND LAP DANCE.” The Nachtkabarett, Nick Kushner,

2001, www.nachtkabarett.com/MarilynMansonArchives/OfficialBBSPostings.

Cell, Soft. “Soft Cell Tainted Love (1981).” YouTube, uploaded by MrCaptivik, 6 Sept. 2009,

www.youtube.com/watch?v=CCTBuOheUpE.

Manson, Marilyn. “Marilyn Manson - Tainted Love (HD).” YouTube, uploaded by HDmjuzik,

21 Mar. 2017, www.youtube.com/watch?v=dbhjEDH4pIk.