Marilyn Manson Goes Hollywood

.c The Associated Press

NEW YORK (AP) -- Trading his death mask for oversized glam rock sunglasses, Marilyn Manson has gone Hollywood -- in spirit and for real.

The outrageous rock star moved to Tinseltown's famed Laurel Canyon, home to the likes of Jimi Hendrix and Jim Morrison when they were outrageous rock stars.

``This whole past year, my house has become a real Hollywood Babylon, Studio 54 type of place,'' Manson says in the Sept. 17 issue of Rolling Stone, adding that he likes to invite semi-forgotten former stars over for karaoke performances.

``So at any given moment, you may have found Leif Garrett or Corey Feldman singing the theme from `Grease,''' Manson says.

The singer-songwriter often criticized -- and in some cases banned -- for his unholy, explicit lyrics and walking corpse persona has traded his blackened- eye-sockets look for lighter makeup and colorful 1970s outfits featuring platform shoes and Elton John-style spectacles.

Manson's new album ``Mechanical Animals'' (due Sept. 15) is a big change too, swapping the teen Satanism and hissing, postindustrial buzzsaw sound from his 1996 album ``Antichrist Superstar'' for melodic guitar grooves and lyrics about spacey sci-fi romance fantasies.

Still, Manson continues to shock mainstream America. The ``Mechanical Animals'' original cover art depicts Manson as a nude, androgynous mannequin. Kmart and Wal-Mart refused to stock CDs with that artwork, so Interscope Records promised a tamer version for them.

``If you're going to pretend to be something,'' Manson explains, ``then you have to at least live up to what it is.''