The same old Garbage

Garbage formed in 1993 amidst a flurry of similar established acts like Sonic Youth and My Bloody Valentine, but while those bands relied totally on their minimalistic walls of sound and brooding lyrics, Garbage infused their tracks with serious pop hooks that, while radio-friendly, didn't insult their fans' intelligence. With producer extraordinaire Butch Vig controlling the boards and edgy Scottish chanteuse Shirley Manson's come-hither vocals everpresent, Garbage's self-titled debut became an MTV staple during the "Buzz Bin" era. Their two following discs, Version 2.0 and Beautiful Garbage, had their hits, but were generally panned.\nBleed Like Me, which features the identical lineup of Garbage that released its debut exactly 10 years ago, starts off with the sneering "Bad Boyfriend" before easing into that groove of upbeat malaise that serious Garbage fans relish wallowing in. The record is nothing if not consistent, which bodes well for Manson and Vig's songwriting chops, even if it's easy to forget where one track ends and another begins.\nThe real problem with Bleed Like Me is that even though Garbage has been around for more than a decade, the album sounds like it came straight out of 1995. "Boys Wanna Fight" makes reasonable attempts at Linkin Park-ish programmed percussion, but soon after we're given "Why Don't You Come Over," which evokes comparisons to the worst of Foo Fighters' B-sides. Perhaps general consistency bodes well for some acts that emerged in the mid-'90s (Oasis and Weezer to name a couple), but for a band like Garbage, who seem destined to write bitter breakup songs until the end of time, the formula wears thin far more easily.\nOddly enough, for an album chiseled out of Vig soundscapes and feelings of breakup animosity, the songs that tend to slow the tempo down just a bit and flow more lethargically transform into the most attention-grabbing tracks. "Run Baby Run" and especially the semi-epic closer and album highlight "Happy Home" tease the band away from their usual 3-and-a-half minute narratively and structurally concise radio hopefuls only to showcase what Garbage could accomplish if only they were still on their indie label, Almo Sounds, and could experiment more freely.\nThough perhaps experimentation isn't in their nature, despite Vig's obvious taste for striving to reach higher planes of sonic greatness, he did produce Nirvana's Nevermind and the Smashing Pumpkins' Siamese Dream. Bleed Like Me is certainly no Siamese Dream or Nevermind, but how many albums are these days? Almost none, I suppose. For now, and maybe for all time, all we have is the same old Garbage.