Charles Manson The Album

Presenter: Anabelle Woods

Presenter Status: Undergraduate student

Department: Music

Funding Source/Sponsor: SYRCE Symposium

Screenshot URL: https://drive.google.com/uc?id=1RoJq3mIAEHn-Coo01iAKvXZUPLhXvKTT

Abstract:
I created an album disk for the notorious American cult leader, murderer and songwriter of the 70's, Charles Manson. I chose the topic of learning about Charles Manson, due to my interest in watching crime documentaries, and always wanting to learn more about the acts. I was able to find out through my research that Charles Manson, was a well known singer and songwriter. His music and murder went hand in hand with one another and based his murders on an understanding of 70's music. On my art piece you can see that, I re-created a look for an album disk, with a bit of a twist by actually writing on it. I included the artist, Charles Manson and was able to use the same font as the famous band, The Beatles. The Sharon Tate and Labianca murders, was a response to The Beatles song, "Helter Skelter." In addition to mentioning that, the disk was inspired by the song "Helter Skelter" and used that as a way to demonstrate what inspired Charles Manson to create this album and write his songs. I used the alternating colors of red and white to express the innocence yet the horrible murders he and The Manson Family committed. In the middle of the album I included fun, 70's colors to represent the theme and wrote the songs that were to be featured on this disk. Each one of those songs, were the songs that Charles Manson wrote, prior to the name being changed by famous bands. An example, Manson was able to record some music with The Beach Boys and they changed his song "Cease to Exist'' to "Never Learn Not to Love." This album disk, is a way to express Charles Manson during the time and to mainly express the fact that, music was what inspired him to become a murderer.