Hole Quit Manson Tour; Plan Solo Outing
by Chris Nelson & Teri vanHorn, March 15, 1999
Hole leader Courtney Love announced Sunday night onstage here that her band is leaving its co-headlining tour with Marilyn Manson only nine dates into the outing.
That final double-billing was cut short 35 minutes into Manson’s set, after the shock-rocker fell onstage. An announcement that followed the fall said the show was cancelled due to a “major injury.” But there was no word Monday (March 15) on how serious Manson’s fall was.
Meanwhile, a Hole spokesman said Monday that Hole would launch their own tour shortly.
“This is our last night on this tour,” Love said, speaking from the Great Western Forum stage here. After a mix of boos and cheers rose from the crowd, someone close to the stage shouted out, “Why?” “I just didn’t want to deal with burning crosses on the outside of the venue and the inside of the venue,” the singer/guitarist answered, referring to Manson’s stage show and the controversy surrounding his shock-rock act.
On Monday, Hole spokesperson Gayle Fine confirmed that the group has quit the tour. “Our plans now are A, to shoot a video [for the upcoming single, “Awful”], and B, to tour on our own [to promote Celebrity Skin],” Fine said. Details about a tour featuring Hole as the sole headliner are “imminent,” she said.
Hole are leaving the tour with 28 dates remaining. As of press time Monday morning, no replacement act had been announced. Fine confirmed that the two bands had differed over production costs, but she declined to elaborate. While Manson’s sets have been elaborate affairs complete with pyrotechnics and assorted electronic props, Hole’s show has been comparatively stripped down.
Manson (born Brian Warner) and Love have been trading barbs both onstage and off since before the tour began in Spokane, Wash., on Feb. 28. The shock-rocker affirmed Hole’s then-impending departure Friday with a terse note posted to his official website (www.marilynmanson.net). The blurb said Manson’s namesake band would continue the tour as scheduled with metal openers Monster Magnet.
During an interview Saturday with KROQ-FM radio, Manson said Hole’s exit had nothing do with personal differences, but that it was simply difficult to open for his band.
Manson made no reference to Hole’s departure during his Sunday night set, which ended abruptly after 35 minutes when the singer fell from an amplifier during the song “Rock Is Dead” (the same title Manson had given the tour).
The band continued playing while Manson lay motionless on the stage. After a few minutes, he was carried off by stagehands.
Several minutes later, an announcement was made over the public address system that the rest of the show was cancelled “due to a major injury of an artist.”
Representatives for Manson could not be reached for comment Monday morning. In separate interviews published last week by the San Francisco Examiner and San Francisco Chronicle, Manson referred to Love as a “bitch.” He also was quoted as saying before the tour that Hole was “the last band in the world I would ever, ever want to tour with.”
“We’re history after this,” Love said Sunday before launching into the set-closing “Celebrity Skin. ” “You’ll get to see the crack of someone’s ass. It will be fun,” she added, a sarcastic reference to Manson’s revealing stage costumes.
“I thought it was rather classy of Courtney that she didn’t go off on how much of a d— she thinks Manson is or whatever,” said Hole fan Layla Grant Mason, 20. Mason bought a Hole T-shirt with the full tour dates listed on the back. “They just went up there and tore it up and it was like, ‘This is our last show on this thing, so we’re just gonna kick ass and move on.’ “
As with several of the stops on the tour, the Great Western Forum was about only half-full during Hole’s set, but was packed by the time Manson came on. “[Marilyn Manson] are so much better off without [Hole],” said Manson fan Garrett Norris, 20. “The whole time Hole were playing, it was like ‘Why did they ever think that would work?’ “