Garbage

“Androgyny,” the first single from Garbage’s Beautiful Garbage, proves an appropriate sampling of the band’s new album: While the track opens with the start-and-stop synthesizer pop of a TRL favorite, it quickly unveils the crunching guitars and harmonies Garbage fans have come to expect. In Beautiful Garbage, the electro-pop rockers offer a satisfying follow-up to 1998’s Version 2.0, once again harkening back to their trademark blend of guitars, electronic-influenced beats and lead singer Shirley Manson’s cynical musings. Led by Manson’s rock-vixen vocals, the quartet’s 1995 debut, Garbage, saw the Madison, Wis.-based band rise quickly amidst the then-decaying alt-rock universe. Fueled by producer/drummer/founder Butch Vig, a veteran of the alternative scene from work with Nirvana and Smashing Pumpkins, the band showed considerable maturity and greater refinement in 2.0 while still breaking out a slew of radio-friendly singles, among them “Special” and “I Think I’m Paranoid.”

In Beautiful Garbage, the band seems conscious of an obvious problem of any established act; the need to evolve while still maintaining a distinctive sound. While Garbage less-than-coyly critique the current pop music landscape with lyrics such as, “Let’s bomb all the factories/That make all the wannabes” (“Parade”) they also show a surprising willingness to sample and attempt the gimmicky sounds of their younger peers. “Cherry Lips (Go Baby Go)” is perhaps the most blatant example, yet Manson shows her causticity can lend unexpected melodic credibility to an otherwise bubble-gum track. The album on the whole continues in 2.0’s path by offering a balance of both driving rock tracks (“Shut Your Mouth” and “Silence is Golden”) and delicate ballads (“Drive You Home” and “So Like a Rose”). Certainly, Beautiful Garbage wanders stylistically at times compared to the Garbage’s previous work, but the band nevertheless show they can update their sound without sacrificing their trademark smirk.

Garbage

Beautiful Garbage

Interscope