garbage : Releases >>
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Absolute Garbage: Greatest Hits/Limited Edition >>
Bleed Like Me >>
Despite making it through a difficult four-year stretch in which the band temporarily broke up, singer Shirley Manson left her husband, and new technologies made the sleek electro-rock sound of its first three albums feel passé, Garbage resurfaces in rude health on Bleed Like Me. Manson is still kickboxing the air and stomping the glitter under her heels, as she channels Debbie Harry and Chrissie Hynde on edgy glam-rock anthems like "Run Baby Run" and "Metal Heart." All the while three bookish producers in the background--including Butch Vig, who famously helmed Nirvana's Nevermind--turn up the sleazy machine-like rhythms. Foo Fighters front man Dave Grohl sits in on the drums for the menacing "Bad Boyfriend," but it's the confessional title track Bleed Like Me"--part "Walk on the Wild Side," part therapy session for former cutter Manson--that shatters Garbage's image as the ultimate non-stick studio band. "You should see my scars," goes the chorus. And, for once, Manson is actually willing to reveal them. --Aidin Vaziri
Garbage >>
Set up by Nirvana producer Butch Vig, featuring two veteran session musicians from Madison, Wisconsin and singer Shirley Manson of no-hit-wonder 1980s Scottish band Goodbye Mr Mackenzie, Garbage surprised themselves as much as anyone else when they hit payout with their debut album. Their success made sense, though. Although it's guitar rock, Garbage were plugged into state-of-the-art studio software, generating a cybergoth sound as black, flexible and synthetic as PVC, capable of odd morphing effects to match the plunging mood swings of tracks like "Vow". In the over-cheery mid-1990s, dominated by Britpop and boy bands, songs like "I'm Only Happy When It Rains" were a welcome antidote, while Shirley Manson emerged as the most potent, self-aware and no-nonsense rock frontwoman since Chrissie Hynde, flaunting the darker side of her psyche with the same menacing intent as she flaunted a pink feather boa onstage. --David Stubbs
Version 2.0 >>
As its title suggests, Version 2.0 is no great departure for Garbage from the sound that made their eponymous 1995 debut such a hit. While much was made of the various band members' chequered pasts (drummer Butch Vig produced Nirvana's Nevermind; singer Shirley Manson was in dreadful Scottish agit-goths Goodbye Mr. MacKenzie), Garbage actually don't sound anything like what these previous projects might have led one to expect. One of the few truly modern rock bands--although for some reason this is often described as being contrived by reactionary critics--Garbage blend traditional rock instrumentation with samples, programming and the close to unlimited possibilities presented by late 1990s recording technology more naturally than many of their "Look at us! We're so contemporary!" peers. While this album fails to match the quality of the debut, it nevertheless has a number of cool moments, including the singles "Special", "When I Grow Up", "I Think I'm Paranoid", and the Beach Boys-quoting "Push It". --Ronita Dutta
Absolute Garbage: Greatest Hits >>
Beautiful Garbage >>
beautifulgarbage sounds much like all the other Garbage albums. When Garbage surfaced in 1995, they already sounded like a confident and mature band, mostly due to the credentials of the band's members: Butch Vig (drums) is one of rock's premier producers, having already worked on hit albums by Nirvana, Smashing Pumpkins and others, while Shirley Manson (vocals) had been performing in bands since her teens. Polished indie rock with an electronic edge, beautifulgarbage picks up where their second album (Version 2.0) ended, with a hook-laden sound that veers from the mosh pit to the dance floor, often in the same song, as crashing guitar riffs vie with synthesizers, theremins, scratching and just about all the studio toys allowed by the band's prodigious imagination, experience and budget. Shirley Manson stills vamps up her lyrics, with mixed results (didn't Blur already do "Androgyny", but better, on "Girls & Boys"?). Fortunately, there are also songs such as "Can't Cry These Tears", which admirably modernises Phil Spector's famous wall of sound and the Mazzy Star-ish "So Like a Rose", while "Cherry Lips (Go Baby Go)" updates Sly Stone's "If You Want Me to Stay" by way of synth, bass and handclaps, and is easily the album's highlight. It may not be ground-breaking stuff, but beautifulgarbage is this band doing what they do best, and doing it well. Again. --Robert Burrow
Beautifulgarbage >>
beautifulgarbage sounds much like all the other Garbage albums. When Garbage surfaced in 1995, they already sounded like a confident and mature band, mostly due to the credentials of the band's members: Butch Vig (drums) is one of rock's premier producers, having already worked on hit albums by Nirvana, Smashing Pumpkins and others, while Shirley Manson (vocals) had been performing in bands since her teens. Polished indie rock with an electronic edge, beautifulgarbage picks up where their second album (Version 2.0) ended, with a hook-laden sound that veers from the mosh pit to the dance floor, often in the same song, as crashing guitar riffs vie with synthesizers, theremins, scratching and just about all the studio toys allowed by the band's prodigious imagination, experience and budget. Shirley Manson stills vamps up her lyrics, with mixed results (didn't Blur already do "Androgyny", but better, on "Girls & Boys"?). Fortunately, there are also songs such as "Can't Cry These Tears", which admirably modernises Phil Spector's famous wall of sound and the Mazzy Star-ish "So Like a Rose", while "Cherry Lips (Go Baby Go)" updates Sly Stone's "If You Want Me to Stay" by way of synth, bass and handclaps, and is easily the album's highlight. It may not be ground-breaking stuff, but beautifulgarbage is this band doing what they do best, and doing it well. Again. --Robert Burrow
Garbage >>
Set up by Nirvana producer Butch Vig, featuring two veteran session musicians from Madison, Wisconsin and singer Shirley Manson of no-hit-wonder 1980s Scottish band Goodbye Mr Mackenzie, Garbage surprised themselves as much as anyone else when they hit payout with their debut album. Their success made sense, though. Although it's guitar rock, Garbage were plugged into state-of-the-art studio software, generating a cybergoth sound as black, flexible and synthetic as PVC, capable of odd morphing effects to match the plunging mood swings of tracks like "Vow". In the over-cheery mid-1990s, dominated by Britpop and boy bands, songs like "I'm Only Happy When It Rains" were a welcome antidote, while Shirley Manson emerged as the most potent, self-aware and no-nonsense rock frontwoman since Chrissie Hynde, flaunting the darker side of her psyche with the same menacing intent as she flaunted a pink feather boa onstage. --David Stubbs
Version 2.0 >>
As its title suggests, Version 2.0 is no great departure for Garbage from the sound that made their eponymous 1995 debut such a hit. While much was made of the various band members' chequered pasts (drummer Butch Vig produced Nirvana's Nevermind; singer Shirley Manson was in dreadful Scottish agit-goths Goodbye Mr. MacKenzie), Garbage actually don't sound anything like what these previous projects might have led one to expect. One of the few truly modern rock bands--although for some reason this is often described as being contrived by reactionary critics--Garbage blend traditional rock instrumentation with samples, programming and the close to unlimited possibilities presented by late 1990s recording technology more naturally than many of their "Look at us! We're so contemporary!" peers. While this album fails to match the quality of the debut, it nevertheless has a number of cool moments, including the singles "Special", "When I Grow Up", "I Think I'm Paranoid", and the Beach Boys-quoting "Push It". --Ronita Dutta
The World Is Not Enough >>
