Shirley Manson on Bowie, cancel culture and Garbage's impressive new album
Shirley Manson, singer with Garbage, releasing new album No Gods No Masters. Picture: SUZANNE CORDEIRO/AFP/Getty
Shirley Manson’s first lockdown was back in 1994 during a bleak mid-western winter while recording Garbage’s debut album and a string of subsequent hits that included I'm Only Happy When It Rains and Stupid Girl. She had entered a black mood wondering why she had even bothered to try out for a band who “just didn’t cut the mustard”.
Now, 27 years and 17 million album sales later, she admits her demeanour was down to her own immaturity. “I was looking at it from a superficial standpoint. I felt we weren’t going to make a record good enough to transcend how we all looked. I had grown up in a band [Goodbye Mr Mackenzie] where we were looking at the coolest rock stars like David Bowie, Iggy Pop and Nick Cave, thinking there is no way we can compete with that legacy.”
It didn’t help that Manson was left to her own devices in a lonely Midwestern hotel, unable to drive or go anywhere while the band went home to their families. But, like many people over the last year, she found being stuck indoors had its advantages.
“I fell in love with the San Antonio Spurs and learned a lot about how they handled themselves in triumph and defeat. I love basketball and baseball and it got me through the recording. The Spurs coach, Gregg Popovich is arguably the greatest coach in sports history,” she enthuses.
Manson describes last year’s lockdown at her home in L.A as “a ghastly experience” before adding: “I’m married to an incredible husband who brought good cheer and made incredible cocktails every day. We would sit and listen to a piece of vinyl and study it; that has kept me alive.”
The cover of Manson's seventh album with Garbage, No Gods No Masters, features a photograph taken by her in an Edinburgh necropolis.
“I happened to be in the Dean Cemetery and these two sister angels appeared out of nowhere, I was like ‘that’s it’. I sent the picture to our graphic artist and he used one of the iconic angels.
“I fought with the record company who didn’t want the vinyl to be neon green. I wondered why they had such a bee in their bonnet until I found out green is the most expensive at which point I said to my manager; ‘this is a hill I will f**king die on’; she said, ‘don’t worry; we’ll get you the green’.”
The daughter of a theologian, Manson grew up in a Church of Scotland family, being taught at Sunday school by her father. Since early teens, she has distanced herself from organised religion but suggests people have pointed out God features strongly on the new record.
“It never occurred to me before, for some inexplicable reason. I don’t know why other than I’m middle-aged, I’m questioning everyone, I’m challenging everything and I guess I’m frustrated at how organised religion is shoring up this patriarchal system that isn’t benefiting anyone apart from old white men.”
The album’s opening cut, The Men Who Rule The World, is an arresting listen. Lyrically her target is firmly fixed: “The men who rule the world/Have made a f**king mess/The history of power/The worship of success.” She describes it as “a futurist modern retelling of Noah’s ark where I am Noah on George Clinton's Mothership.
"I come down to save everything beautiful, divine and worth saving while leaving everything that’s wretched, cruel and violent behind. The band just really killed it and met the energy of the song; all of us were laughing… what a weird song.”
The track’s jagged and funky riffs recall Bowie’s Fame as well as a hint of his maligned 1990s output.
“We’re such big fans, his name thrills any time we can get close to that genius. He was treated abysmally [during the '90s] then when he died they started playing Bowie on the radio; what a joke, how about playing him while he was alive?”
Manson has struggled with aspects of the fame-game through the years, not least when she became an alternative pin-up and covergirl not long after the band released their 1995 debut. That record was followed by Version 2.0 three years later and both albums went on to shift 4 million copies apiece.
“We found ourselves in some ludicrous situations. I think one that strikes me and that also highlights the ludicrousness of the industry was Bob Dylan, can I underline that… Bob Dylan... was going on before Garbage! It was on a festival stage, also Patti Smith and Nick Cave. We were mortified that these three amazing icons of songwriting and artistry were going on before a relatively new band. How come festival organisers and so on are not noticing how disrespectful and outrageous that is?
"At what point as a culture are we going to value things of depth and importance, why are we valuing money and ten-a-penny artists that will be never remembered? Some of these artists are struggling to get on the page; that’s a joke!”
While sexual misconduct allegations have been to the fore in the music industry in recent times, Manson admits she isn't always onboard with the cancel culture that accompanies them.
“I don’t know one single artist that is without sin,” says Manson of musicians being cancelled. “There’s no one without failings as human beings, for us to expect perfection from artists in particular but humans in general is naive and sort of unrealistic.
“If a human being makes a beautiful or essential piece art that brings you joy, that art exists whether the person behind it is flawed or not. If we were to cancel anyone who has ever done anything wrong we would end up with shite music, movies and shite everything; it would be the blandest world you could imagine. You could cancel the great David Bowie if you care to for numerous things or Iggy Pop… the list is endless and they are all capable of great mistakes as are we all.”
Manson says she was very moved by the death of Sean Connery, a fellow Edinburgh native who inspired many of her generation. “He was the representation of dreams for a lot of Scottish people; we didn’t have anyone at that level or in Hollywood and there was Sean in this incredible iconic role representing Scotland on the world stage, we’d never seen anything like that before.”
With Garbage she was also the third Scottish female after Lulu and Sheena Easton to sing a Bond theme, recording The World Is Not Enough for the nineteenth 007 film in 1999.
“It makes sense that Scottish singers would be well represented in the litany of Bond themes because of course Ian Fleming, the writer was a Scotsman [by descent]. There’s an inherent understanding of what that franchise is trying to do and does so to get invited to be part of the longest and most important film franchise in the history of cinema was spectacular, I’m very proud of that, it’s a glorious part of our history.”
- No Gods No Masters is out on Friday June 11
