Today I’m gonna take you back only 16 years. 😀
The self-titled debut album by Garbage released on August 15, 1995 was considered innovative for its fusion of Pop melodies with Alternative Rock, Trip-Hop and Electronica genres and its use of loops and sampling. 6 songs out of 12 became successful singles. “Garbage” spent over a year on both the US and UK charts, reaching the top 20 on charts worldwide and receiving multi-platinum certification in numerous territories. The album’s success was helped by the band promoting it on a year-long tour, including playing on the European festival circuit and supporting the Smashing Pumpkins throughout 1996, as well as by a run of increasingly successful singles culminating with “Stupid Girl” which in 1997 was nominated for Grammy Awards for Best Rock Song and Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group.
Duke Erikson (bass, guitar, keyboards, percussion) and Butch Vig (drums, percussion) had been in numerous bands, including Spooner and Fire Town and they worked mainly with Steve Marker as a sound engineer, who also plays guitar and keyboards. In 1983, Vig and Marker founded Smart Studios in Madison and Vig’s production work brought him to the attention of Sub Pop.
Vig is also known as “Nevermind Man” because he produced The Smashing Pumpkins’ “Gish” and Nirvana’s “Nevermind”, but also some records as Sonic Youth’s “Dirty” and “Experimental Jet Set, Trash and No Star”, Helmet’s “Betty” and more recently Green Day’s “21st Century Breakdown”.
A short-term reformation and album from Spooner inspired Erikson, Marker and Vig to form a band: tired of using their own work for remixes, they decided to keep the material for their own project. Initial sessions with Vig on vocals, along with the members’ past work with all-male groups, led to the band’s desire for a woman on lead.
Scottish singer Shirley Manson had been performing with the Edinburgh rock band Goodbye Mr. Mackenzie since 1984. In 1993, several band members, including Manson, changed their name to Angelfish. Marker was watching 120 Minutes when he saw the music video for Angelfish’s “Suffocate Me”. He showed the video to Erikson and Vig while their manager Shannon O’Shea tracked Manson down. They met for the first time in London in April 1994. Later that evening Vig was informed of Kurt Cobain’s suicide…
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Angelfish disbanded at the end of the Live tour.
Manson began to work on the then-skeletal “Stupid Girl”, “Queer” and “Vow”, ad-libbing the line: “I can’t use what I can’t abuse” and also “like Joan of Arc coming back for more”.
Garbage sent out demo tapes with no bio, to avoid a bidding war over Vig’s production history. Garbage signed with Mushroom U.K worldwide – excluding North America – and secured the band a Volume magazine compilation inclusion and the only potential candidate for release was “Vow”, being the only song which the band had completed production. “Vow” debuted on Hot Modern Rock Tracks at #39. It climbed gradually over the following weeks, peaking at #26 twice and it spent two weeks on the Billboard Hot 100 staying at #97 both weeks.
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From the surprising stop and goes of “Supervixen” through the mysterious perfume of “Queer”,the dark grooves of “Only Happy When It Rains” till “Vow” or the almost Industrial layers of “As Heaven Is Wide”, to the sparkling “Stupid Girl” and the pumping “Milk”, “Garbage” was an absolutely fresh cut of music overlapping genres, styles and approaches and delivering a brand new spirit for the Alternative music melting into one Rock, Gothic and Pop orientations.
Track list:
01. “Supervixen” – 3:55
02. “Queer” – 4:36
03. “Only Happy When It Rains” – 3:56
04. “As Heaven Is Wide” – 4:44
05. “Not My Idea” – 3:41
06. “A Stroke of Luck” – 4:44
07. “Vow” – 4:30
08. “Stupid Girl” – 4:18 (Garbage, Strummer, Jones)
09. “Dog New Tricks” – 3:56
10. “My Lover’s Box” – 3:55
11. “Fix Me Now” – 4:43
12. “Milk” – 3:53
Garbage – Official Site
Garbage @ Facebook
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1HBxUWSxcq8&w=500&h=305]
