Garbage

Garbage is an American-Scottish alternative rock band formed in Madison, Wisconsin, in 1993. The group consists of Scottish musician Shirley Manson (vocals, keyboards, guitar) and American musicians Duke Erikson (bass, guitar, keyboards), Steve Marker (guitar, keyboards), and Butch Vig (drums, percussion). All four members are involved in songwriting and production. The band have counted worldwide album sales of over 17 million units.

Duke Erikson and Butch Vig had been in several bands, including Spooner and Fire Town (with Steve Marker as a sound engineer). In 1983, Vig and Marker founded Smart Studios in Madison and Vig's production work brought him to the attention of Sub Pop. Spooner reunited in 1990 and released another record, but disbanded in 1993 as Vig and Marker's career as producers gained strength. In 1994, as Vig become "kind of burned out on doing really long records," he got together with Erikson and Marker, and they started doing remixes for acts such as U2, Depeche Mode, Nine Inch Nails and House of Pain. The remixes featured different instrumentation, and often highlighting new guitar hooks and bass grooves. This experience inspired the three men to form a band, where they "wanted to take that remix sensibility and somehow translate it into all of the possibilities of a band setup." An early comment that their work sounded "like garbage" inspired the band's name.

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.[18] Marker declared that their desire for a female vocalist was one "who didn't have a high, chirpy, girly quality to her voice", similar to Patti Smith and Chrissie Hynde, and Vig added that they wanted someone that could sing in an understated way in contrast to "these alterna-rock singers [that] have a tendency to scream". 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 down the band's singer, Shirley Manson. When Manson was contacted, she did not know who Vig was and was urged to check the credits on Nevermind, the popular Nirvana album which Vig produced.

On April 8, 1994, Manson met Erikson, Marker, and Vig for the first time in London. Later that evening Vig was informed of Nirvana frontman Kurt Cobain's suicide. Garbage was put on hold until Angelfish was finished touring North America in support of Live. Erikson, Marker, and Vig attended the Metro Chicago date, and Manson was invited to Madison to audition for the band.The audition did not go well, but Manson socialized with the men while there and they found they had a similar taste in music. Angelfish disbanded at the end of the Live tour. Manson called O'Shea and asked to audition again, feeling that "it could work out".

Manson described her first session with the band as "a disaster", as she had no experience as a session player, and she and the band were "two parties totally uncomfortable with the situation", but the "mutual disdain" from that meeting managed to pull the band together. The first songs were skeletal versions of the songs "Stupid Girl", "Queer" and "Vow", which led to some ad-libbed lyrics by Manson. Manson had never written a song prior to this session; nevertheless, this time she was invited to join the band.

In August 15, 1995, Garbage debuted on the Billboard 200 at No. 193. In the United Kingdom, its release was preceded by non-album track "Subhuman" and "Only Happy When It Rains" as singles to promote the album instead of "Queer".The album debuted on the UK album chart at No. 12. In Australia, the album debuted at No. 5. "Queer" was quickly released in the UK and Europe, while Garbage began their first tour. Garbage was nominated for Brit Awards for Best New Band and Best International Newcomer.


Discography
Main article: Garbage discography
Studio albums
Garbage (1995)
Version 2.0 (1998)
Beautiful Garbage (2001)
Bleed Like Me (2005)
Not Your Kind of People (2012)
Strange Little Birds (2016)



Members
Band members
Shirley Manson – vocals, keyboards, guitar
Steve Marker – guitar, keyboards
Duke Erikson – bass guitar, keyboards, guitar, percussion
Butch Vig – drums, percussions