Marilyn Manson’s Mansinthe Rocks Sleepy Switzerland
KALLNACH, Switzerland — Few people in this quiet village of quaint chalets know the album “Eat Me, Drink Me,” by Marilyn Manson, the shock rocker. But almost everyone knows his taste for absinthe.
There could hardly be a greater contrast between Mr. Manson, the American bad boy who introduced the golden age of grotesque, and the 1,500 people who live quietly in the squat farmhouses strung out along Kallnach’s main street, their eaves reaching almost to the ground.
“They’re completely different,” said Beat Läderach, 47, who has been the town manager for 17 years. “We live off the land, a very sleepy existence. But it has its advantages: There is little unemployment, no vandalism; life is modest, comfortable, friendly.”
Yet Mr. Manson’s link to the town “is important for us,” Mr. Läderach said. The name Kallnach has become well known, he said, thanks to the success of a superpremium absinthe developed with Mr. Manson.
