Ain't No Party like a Manson Party
1969 was a summer of love, drugs, and the Manson family. The leader of this familyesque quasi-commune was the prolific and dangerous American criminal and aspiring musician Charles Manson, a big time fan of the Beatles. In November of 1968 just prior the Fab Four released what some would come to believe their best album, The White album which included the iconic tracks, Piggies, Helter Skelter, and Revolution 9. Fans of the Beatles often found joy in interpreting their lyrical stylings, finding the common theme of love, or opening ones mind. Manson picked the album apart and in it he found plenty of clues that give life to his odd apocalyptic self-fulfilling prophesy. “His belief in an impending race war,…show more content… Manson also believed that his murders would help to precipitate that war. Clearly, Manson heard something in the songs lyrics, that the normal listeners had somehow missed. “The Helter Skelter is a British fairground attraction that involves sliding down a spiral chute on a mat— hence the opening line” which is where the line “when I get to the bottom I go back to the top of the slide” came into being (Niezgoda). It was of coursed used to “suggest the exhilaration and out-of-control thrill of a highly sexual love affair” of which the Beatles were known for having (Niezgoda). Which could be seen in this set of lyrics, “Do you, don't you want me to love you/ I'm coming down fast but I'm miles above you/ Tell me tell me tell me come on tell me the answer/ You may be a lover but you ain't no dancer./ Helter skelter helter skelter/ Helter skelter.”However on the other hand, Manson “simply took the first syllable of the title and ran with it, believing it referred to an imminent descent into the bowels of Hell”(Niezgoda). Brooke Poston a member of the Manson family was even quoted that Manson told the group on New Year's Eve 1968: "Are you hep to what the Beatles are saying? Helter Skelter is coming down. The Beatles are telling it like it is" (Bugliosi). The term…show more content… Vincent Bugliosi who was the lead prosecutor in the Manson Family case wrote that Charles believe that the Beatles themselves wee prophets who were looking for Jesus Christ and that Manson himself was the Christ that they were in search of. Manson also “regarded the Beatles as the “four angels” of the apocalypse referred to in the Bible in Revelation 9” (Graeme) In Revelation 9 cited the image of prophets as having “ faces as the faces of men” but with “the hair of women” with mopish hair longer than the norm for men, could easily be mistaken as the Fab Four themselves (Graeme). During the Manson favorite, there is a part of the song where Lennon screams the word “ right”, however Manson misheard this as the word “rise” of which he later used as an incitement that one day the race war would ensue and that the black community would rise against the middle white class. From then on “rise” became one of his many phrases found painted in blood. Bugliosi also had notes that Manson believed “Revolution 9” was a reference to the