Garbage rolled through Kemba Live’s indoor venue on the evening of Wednesday, October 1st, with LA alt-rock opening act, Starcrawler. Promoting their 8th and most recent album, Let All That We Imagine Be The Light on their first tour in nearly a decade, Garbage proved themselves still to be a well-oiled machine.
Founded in Madison, WI in 1993 by Americans, bassist Duke Erikson, drummer Steve Marker, and guitarist Butch Vig, the group did not become Garbage proper until the incorporation of Scottish vocalist Shirly Manson on the date of Kurt Cobain’s death in 1994. Over 30 years, 8 albums later, over 20 million album sales, and one Bond theme song later, Garbage are best known for hits such as “Only Happy When It Rains,” “Stupid Girl,” and “I Think I’m Paranoid,” among others.
Their injections of femme punk, electronic rock, industrial, and even trip hop into alternative rock airwaves to play a major part in defining the genre’s sound in the 1990s, such that, as put by a recent press release, their “unique sound, songwriting and electric live performances have inspired worldwide adoration, chart success and critical acclaim. They are considered one of the most influential bands of their generation.”
Garbage are frequently compared to Hole and No Doubt for bringing grunge and/or punk edginess into mainstream popularity in the 90s, with all three groups being helmed by female vocalists. However, rather than going solo and tending more toward pop like Stefani, Manson stayed with the group and experimented more together with the electronic and industrial touches that set Garbage apart from their 1995 self-titled debut.
However, despite being so well-accomplished, Garbage are not ready for victory laps, legacy tours, and greatest hits compilation albums. Let All That We Imagine Be The Light, released in May of 2025, fuses an appropriate amount of the youthful edginess known and loved by fans, with a more mature, reflective tone that comes with time.
Most importantly to their fans, this album checks all of the boxes of what makes a Garbage album a Garbage album: what the album’s press release, as per Sacks & Co PR, calls “big angular guitars, precise, propulsive beats and cinematic soundscapes all lurk beneath Shirley Manson’s unmistakable voice, her lyrics bristling with attitude.”
The visual centerpiece of the Let All That We Imagine Be The Light album cover is a submerged octopus with a white light cutting through dark red waters to shine upon it. The dark muted neon color palette and unclear motion of the octopus encapsulates an eerie, almost haunting yet
nevertheless unthreatening feeling that permeates much of the album. The track that best exemplified this sentiment for me both live and on record was “The Day That I Met God.” Played as a show-closer before a two-song encore, this song pulls the listener down in a tramadolesque descent, while employing a nearly deep, aquatic electronic 1990s production sound.
What the album’s press release refers to as “the sound of a group at the peak of their creative powers – characteristically harnessing sonic juxtapositions and moods to create an album that thrums equally with both light and shade,” this album is an especially impressive display of the band’s production abilities, which they were also able to translate well to live performance.
The live visuals were also a testament to the album’s juxtaposition; with the band dressed entirely in dark clothes and the stage backdrop a uniform, well-utilized beaded silvery mesh, the light show largely dictated the tone of each song. With some numbers featuring warm neons projected onto the backdrop and others into the crowd, an overwhelming white akin to the crazy highbeams you see on the highway these days, they really got the point across with everything we imagine being light.
Manson has built a reputation for being timelessly cool, and although I expected her to be a magnetic performer– and she surpassed my expectations, even taking up the role of ‘cool aunt / comedian’ in pleasant conversational interludes between songs.
In one such interlude with a distinctly more serious tone at an earlier tour date in Washington D.C, Manson indicated that it was unlikely that Garbage would tour North America, as “the logistics of touring in American have become difficult, blaming “the thievery of the record industry,”’ as reported by Penn Live.
Nevertheless, both the setlist and the performance were perfect summations of Garbage’s thirty-year history, and if this is the last that America sees of Garbage, they left us on a high note.
SETLIST:
1. There’s No Future in Optimism
2. Hold
3. I Think I’m Paranoid
4. Vow
5. Run Baby Run
6. The Trick Is to Keep Breathing
7. Not My Idea
8. Hammering in My Head
9. Wolves
10. #1 Crush
11. Bleed Like Me
12. Queer
13. Chinese Fire Horse
14. When I Grow Up
15. Push It
16. Cherry Lips (Go Baby Go!)
17. The Day That I Met God
18. Stupid Girl
19. Only Happy When it Rains
SOURCES:
Press Releases
https://sacksco.com/pr/garbage.html
‘90s rocker says band won’t tour North America any longer: Here’s why https://www.pennlive.com/entertainment/2025/09/90s-rocker-says-band-wont-tour-north-america n-any-longer-heres-why.html
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