Shirley Manson

Shirley Ann Manson (born 26 August 1966) is a Scottish musician and actress. She is best known as the lead singer of the American alternative rock band Garbage. Manson gained media attention for her forthright style, rebellious attitude, and distinctive voice. For the majority of her career, Manson commuted between her home city of Edinburgh and the U.S. to record with Garbage, which originally formed in Madison, Wisconsin; she now lives and works primarily in Los Angeles, while maintaining a second home in Edinburgh.

Manson's musical career began in her teens when she was approached to perform backing vocals and keyboards for the band Goodbye Mr Mackenzie. She developed a formidable stage presence, and was later approached by the band's record label with the idea of launching her as a solo artist. She recorded an album with her band under the name Angelfish. After seeing Manson in an Angelfish music video broadcast only once on MTV's '' 120 Minutes'', Garbage invited her to audition, and she eventually joined the band. In 1995, Garbage released their self-titled debut album, a critical and commercial success. The band have released seven studio albums, including the multiple Grammy Award-nominated '' Version 2.0'' and a greatest hits album. Garbage have toured worldwide and sold over 17 million records as of 2017.

In 2006, Manson began to write and record solo material after Garbage went on hiatus. In 2008, she played a liquid metal T-1001 Terminator named Catherine Weaver in the second season of '' Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles''. She returned to the recording studio in 2010 to write and produce material for Garbage's fifth studio album, ''Not Your Kind of People'', released in 2012. The band followed up with '' Strange Little Birds'' in 2016 and '' No Gods No Masters'' in 2021.

Early life

Shirley Ann Manson was born in Edinburgh on 26 August 1966, the daughter of Muriel Flora (née MacKay) and John Mitchell Manson.Information gleaned from exhibition research and materials showcased at Famous Scots Exhibition held at New Register House, Edinburgh; Shirley Manson leg ran from 25 May – 17 July 2009, under the Homecoming Scotland banner Her father, a descendant from the fishing community of Northmavine, was a university lecturer, while her mother was a big band singer who had been adopted by a Lothian-based family at an early age and took on the family name MacDonald. Manson was named after an aunt, who was herself named after Charlotte Brontë's novel ''Shirley''. She has two sisters: Lindy-Jayne, who is two years older than her and Sarah, who is two years younger than her. They were brought up in the Comely Bank and Stockbridge areas of Edinburgh. She attended Broughton High School and her childhood education was informed by the Church of Scotland (her father was her Sunday School teacher) until age 12.

Manson's first public performance was in 1970, at age four, with her older sister in an amateur show held at the local Church Hill Theatre. Enrolled at Flora Stevenson Primary School, she received instruction in recorder, clarinet, and fiddle, and learned ballet and piano from extramural classes at age seven. Manson was a member of Girlguiding UK throughout this period of her youth as a Brownie and a Girl Guide. She attended the City of Edinburgh Music School, the music department of Broughton High School. While at Broughton, she became an active member of its drama group, performing in amateur dramatic and musical performances such as '' The American Dream'' and '' The Wizard of Oz'', while also singing with the Waverley Singers, a local girl choir. A 1981 Edinburgh Festival Fringe production of ''Maurice the Minotaur'', in which Manson played a prophet, was awarded a Fringe First award by ''The Scotsman'' newspaper.

While she enjoyed primary school, Manson was bullied while in her first year at secondary school, causing her to suffer from depression and body dysmorphic disorder and engage in self-injury: she carried sharp objects in the laces of her boots and would cut herself when she felt low self-esteem, stress, or anxiety. The bullying stopped when Manson associated herself with a rebel crowd, which resulted in her rebelling herself. She was absent for most of her final year at school and began smoking cannabis, sniffing glue, drinking alcohol, shoplifting, and on one occasion breaking into Edinburgh Zoo. Manson had teenage ambitions to become an actress, but was rejected by the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama (RSAMD). Her first job was volunteer work in a local hospital's cafeteria, then as a breakfast waitress at a local hotel, before spending five years as a shop assistant for Miss Selfridge. She started on the shop's makeup counters, but was eventually moved into stockrooms because of her attitude toward customers. She became well known throughout Edinburgh's clubbing scene; making use of free samples from Miss Selfridge, she styled hair for a number of local bands. She also briefly modelled clothing for '' Jackie'' magazine.

Career

Goodbye Mr Mackenzie

Manson's first musical experiences came from briefly singing with local Edinburgh acts The Wild Indians and performed backing vocals with Autumn 1904. While she was performing with her group, Manson was approached by Goodbye Mr Mackenzie's lead Martin Metcalfe to join his band. Manson was in a relationship with Metcalfe initially, but remained working with the band after splitting from him and became a prominent member, performing keyboards, backing vocals and becoming involved in the band's business side. Manson's first release with the Mackenzies was a YTS release of "Death of a Salesman" in 1984. The group signed a major-label record deal with Capitol Records in 1987, and they released their first album '' Good Deeds and Dirty Rags'', and their only UK top 40 entry "The Rattler". In 1990, the group's contract was transferred to Parlophone, another EMI label, but after two singles failed to chart Parlophone declined to release the group's second album '' Hammer and Tongs''.

Gary Kurfirst, who managed Talking Heads and Debbie Harry, bought the Mackenzies contract and issued their second album through his own label Radioactive Records, a subsidiary of MCA Records. After another single failed to chart, the group were persuaded to leave Radioactive by their management. The Mackenzies continued to write material; Manson was also given the opportunity to record lead vocals on a number of tracks planned for the band's third album. Although MCA had no desire to further their commitments to Goodbye Mr. Mackenzie, the label expressed interest in recording an album with Manson, and after hearing several demos, Kurfirst signed Manson to Radioactive as a solo artist, with the remaining Mackenzies performing as her backing band to circumvent the band's existing deal with MCA. Manson's contract obliged her to deliver at least one album and, at the sole option of Radioactive, up to six additional albums.

Angelfish

Recording under the name Angelfish, and using some of the newly written material and a previously released Mackenzie b-side, Manson and the group recorded the tracks that would make up the '' Angelfish'' album in Connecticut with Talking Heads' Chris Frantz and Tina Weymouth. A lead in track " Suffocate Me" was sent to college radio where it was well received. ''Angelfish'' and second single "Heartbreak to Hate" followed in 1994. Angelfish toured Belgium, Canada, France, and the U.S. The band co-supported Live on a tour of North America, along with Vic Chestnutt. The music video for "Suffocate Me" was aired once on MTV's '' 120 Minutes''. Producer and musician Steve Marker caught the broadcast and thought Manson would be a great singer for his band, Garbage, which also featured producers Duke Erikson and Butch Vig.

Garbage

Vig invited Manson to Smart Studios to sing on a couple of tracks. After an unsuccessful audition, she returned to Angelfish. Manson admitted she felt intimidated showcasing herself to Vig, who produced bands she admired such as Nirvana, Sonic Youth, and The Smashing Pumpkins, and Vig added that the audition's disorganized nature along with the Americans not understanding Manson's Scottish accent caused communication problems. At the end of the Live tour, Angelfish imploded and Manson returned to Smart for a second try. She began to work on the then-skeletal origins of some songs and the band invited her to become a full-time member and finish the album; she co-wrote and co-produced the entire album with the rest of the band.153 F.Supp.2d 462 RADIOACTIVE, J.V., Plaintiff, v. Shirley MANSON, Defendant. No. 01 Civ.1948(SAS). United States District Court, S.D. New York. (29 July 2001) In August 1994, Radioactive gave their permission for Manson to work with Garbage. The band's debut album '' Garbage'' was released in August 1995, and went on to sell over 4 million copies, buoyed by a run of high charting singles including "Only Happy When It Rains" and " Stupid Girl." Manson quickly became the public face of the band over the course of a tour that took the band through to the end of 1996. Echo & the Bunnymen had asked Manson to sing on their 1997 comeback album.

Manson became the band's chief songwriter for the follow-up record '' Version 2.0'' which equalled the success of the band's debut record after its May 1998 release. During the two-year tour in support of the record, Manson modelled for Calvin Klein. Manson lived in hotels throughout the recording periods of the debut and Version 2.0. The group recorded the theme song to the James Bond movie ''The World Is Not Enough,'' and Manson became the third Scotswoman to sing a Bond theme after Lulu and Sheena Easton. In the accompanying video, she portrays an android assassin. For the recording of Garbage's third record throughout 2000, Manson became one of the first high-profile artists to write a blog online, while she decided to improve her guitar playing for the band's next tour. Their third album, ''Beautiful Garbage'', featured Manson's most forward and personal lyrics to date. The album did not sell as well as its predecessors, but Garbage performed a successful world tour in support of it. During a concert at the Roskilde Festival, Manson's voice gave out. She afterwards discovered a vocal fold cyst, and had to undergo corrective surgery.

Manson's lyrics became more overtly political for Garbage's fourth record, 2005's ''Bleed Like Me,'' which after the surprise success of lead-in single "Why Do You Love Me", posted some of the band's highest chart positions upon release. Garbage began an extended hiatus in October 2005. During this period, in 2007, Garbage reformed to perform a short set at a benefit show to raise cash to pay for Wally Ingram's medical treatment, shared song ideas via the internet, recorded new material, and filmed a music video to promote the band's ''Absolute Garbage'' greatest hits compilation. Garbage returned to the studio in 2010 to write and record material for a fifth album, entitled ''Not Your Kind of People'' and subsequently released in May 2012, thus ending the band's seven-year hiatus from recording.

In 2021, Garbage supported Alanis Morissette's 2020 World Tour: Celebrating 25 Years of Jagged Little Pill, which had been postponed due to COVID-19. At several performances, Manson wore a variation on "Garden Witch Overalls", popularised by feminist poet Kate Baer through her interview on the podcast ''Gee Thanks, Just Bought It'', hosted by Caroline Moss. Manson paired the overalls with knee-high boots and assorted t-shirts.

Garbage's alternative musical style fuses various genres including electronic rock, industrial rock, punk, grunge, trip hop and shoegaze.

Solo work and unreleased album

Manson confirmed in March 2006 that she had begun work on a solo album, working with musician Paul Buchanan, producer Greg Kurstin, and film composer David Arnold, stating that she had "no timetable" for completing the project. In 2007, Manson collaborated with Rivers Cuomo of Weezer. Manson presented some of her work to Geffen Records in 2008, who found it "too noir", prompting Manson and Geffen to terminate her contract by mutual agreement. Manson later elaborated, " effenwanted me to have international radio hits and 'be the Annie Lennox of my generation'. I kid you not; I am quoting directly." "I made a quiet, very dark, non-radio-friendly record," she recalled. "I'm not interested in writing nursery rhymes for the masses."

Manson continued to write material while without a record deal and had been in talks with David Byrne and Ray Davies about a potential collaboration. In 2009, Manson posted three demos on her Facebook profile, written by her and Kurstin, titled "In the Snow", "Pretty Horses" and "Lighten Up". "Pretty Horses" was later featured in the pilot episode of the show ''Conviction''. 14 additional songs co-written with Kurstin and registered on copyright and performance rights societies included Don't Want To Pretend, Don't Want Anyone Hurt, Gone Upside, Hot Shit, Kid Ourselves, Little Dough, Pure Genius, Sweet Old World, Spooky, So Shines A Good Deed, The Desert, No Regrets, Stop, To Be King.

In 2009, Manson announced she was stepping away from music, saying she got sick of the music industry's new practices and had found more excitement in acting. Manson said she thought about abandoning the music business in 2008, when her mother developed dementia, and later died, saying that "I didn't want to make music, didn't feel creative. I could barely function." Later that year she reconsidered her words and went back into performing after being asked by friends to sing David Bowie's " Life on Mars?" at their son's memorial. According to Manson, "we were all in so much pain, but it meant so much to them that I could sing that song and so much to me that I was able to do something. It made me realise how much music sustains people. I don't know why I'd turned my back on it."

Manson also worked with a number of artists outside of her solo project, reciting a verse of a long poem for a Chris Connelly album, co-writing and recording a duet with Eric Avery for his solo debut recording with Debbie Harry. Although not recording material with them, Manson also performed on-stage with The Pretenders, Iggy Pop, Incubus and Kings of Leon in Atlantic City, with Gwen Stefani and twice with No Doubt in Universal City. Manson also performed in an uncredited role as a dominatrix in the music video for She Wants Revenge's single " These Things". Most recently Manson performed vocals on a track written by Serj Tankian entitled "The Hunger", a single from the rock musical ''Prometheus Bound''.

In January 2012, Manson confirmed that work on her solo album had been cancelled, stating the album " sdead and buried. We had the funeral. It was sad and I cried a lot but it made such a beautiful corpse that we had an open casket."

Artistry

Voice

Manson possesses a contralto vocal range, which has been noted for its distinctive qualities as well as her emotive delivery. Elysa Gardner of the ''Los Angeles Times'' stated "one of Garbage's most compelling features is a force of nature: Manson's vocals, which can convey a multitude of emotions without ever coming across as melodramatic".

Reviewing a live Garbage performance, Jon Pareles'' commented, "Temptress, lover, sufferer, scrapper – those have been Ms. Manson's personae since Garbage started in 1995. In other eras she might have been a pop torch singer, a soul belter or a new-wave frontwoman: a Shirley Bassey, a Dusty Springfield, or a Chrissie Hynde. There's a little of each of them in her voice" also stating "In the course of each song she let her voice rise in anger, contempt or passion". ''Green Left Weekly'', in a review of '' Garbage'', remarked that Manson "vocalist and guitarist, has a powerful voice, which soars and dips like a bird. It can plead or demand. It can sound dreamy or psychotic." Reviewing a 2012 live Garbage performance, Catherine Gee of ''The Daily Telegraph'' noted that Manson "remains a striking performer whose distinctive contralto snarl can still raise the hairs on the back of your neck." In a review of '' Garbage'', Stephen Thomas Erlewine of AllMusic described Manson's voice as "thin and airy", whilst Mike Diver of the BBC
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