It’s a cliche to say you can take the person out of the country but can’t take the country out of the person. It certainly seems to be true of Shirley Manson, however.
Despite having spent the past three decades on the west coast of the United States, frequent trips back to Edinburgh, where she was born, have ensured that she retains her brogue. She would feel at a loss, she says, if the city were no longer in her life.
“My accent has softened just by default, living in America for so long. If you watch interviews of me when I was young, the accent is so much broader than it is now, and that’s not something I feel good about. At the same time, I realise I still sound Scottish, so I’m not going to sweat it too much.”
Manson is talking in the run-up to the release of Let All That We Imagine Be the Light, the eighth album by Garbage, the rock band whose instantly recognisable frontwoman she has been since the mid-1990s, when the group’s self-titled debut album, from 1995, introduced a sleeker, more experimental and dynamic version of alt rock.
Garbage’s blend of the strikingly commanding musician, lyricist and singer with three studious American musicians, in Duke Erikson, Steve Marker and Butch Vig – also an acclaimed producer, best known at the time for his work on the Nirvana album Nevermind – proved hugely successful.
The band racked up international hits with both albums and singles, as well as Grammy nominations and the commission to write the theme song for the James Bond film The World Is Not Enough.
Although not the most prolific of acts, Garbage remain a going concern, releasing muscular, melodic music. Vig’s production skills give the music its titanium-like sheen; Manson’s potent lyrics and voice give it ballast.
The new album didn’t arrive without a modicum of trouble, however.
“The minute you finish it and send it, you’re riddled with regret,” Manson says. “Making the record was such a disparate experience that when we first finished it, I said to my husband” – the recording engineer and producer Billy Bush, whom Manson married in 2010 – “that I hate everything I’ve done on this record, all my melodies, all my words.
“I had a sort of tantrum about it, and there was a moment when I said to him that I don’t want this to come out. Then I calmed down and realised a lot of my feelings about the record were surrounded by the fact that it had been such a physical struggle for me, and it wasn’t at all a joyous experience.”
Manson is referring to three years of intense pain that she went through in requiring both hips to be replaced, one at the beginning of the work for the new album, the other at the very end of the recording process.
“In the run-ups to both surgeries I was on a lot of pain medication. I had a lot of brain fog, so I had to focus on my physicality, which is something I’ve never had to do in my life before. Being physical has come very naturally to me. I’ve been gifted with a very healthy little body that has propelled me through life into my 50s with never a backwards glance.
“But then all of a sudden I was shuffling, literally, through Beverly Hills to my doctor’s surgery in sweatsuits, no makeup, and a Zimmer frame. People talk about moments in their lives when they were stripped of their pride. That time would be the moment in my life when I was absolutely stripped of any pride I might have ever had.”
What she was going through forced her to adopt a new perspective. “It turned out to be a kind of magical ride in a funny way, even though it was hard,” she says. “I can’t divorce my physical pain from the making of the new record, because they’re so intrinsically linked. I had to change the way I chose to think, and I had to change a lot of my practices.
“That required discipline and patience, each of which I have had very little of in my life. Even though it was challenging, it was a positive experience, and ultimately it taught me some very profound lessons, for which I’m very grateful.”
The loss of mobility “taught me to focus on tiny incremental changes. When you literally cannot walk you have to teach yourself how to walk again. You have to apply patience, discipline and hope”.
Her confidence had flowed away. “I got very depressed. I had no control over my body, but I realised that if I didn’t kick some positivity into my life with my mind, then I was doomed.”
One of the challenges was to avoid letting her mind run riot.
“My imagination has been a terror my whole life, but now I was starting to learn how to harness it a bit better. That has been a wonderful realisation from the past few years, that I can change my mind, harness my mind. I was never fully aware of that before.
[ Shirley Manson: ‘I’m still a work in progress and a shambling mess’Opens in new window ]
“I’m a cerebral person, in a way. I spend far too much time thinking about stuff, but the past few years have taught me to be in my body, it taught me to move my body and it taught me to persevere.”
Manson’s post-surgery physiotherapy is now long behind her, she says, and she’s back to full fitness. “I’ve always been fit, always sort of athletic, always gone to the gym. I mean, the miracle of the body is astounding, and the genius of medical science is amazing, so it’s all good and it’s all in the past.
“However, it did help me birth a very different approach as we were making the album, while the lyrics have been completely influenced by the physical trauma I was finding myself in and infused the words with an entirely different perspective.”
This is perhaps nowhere more obvious than in Chinese Fire Horse, in which Manson sings about people’s perception of age: “you say my time is over, that I have gotten old, that I no longer do it for you, that my face now leaves you cold. You say I’m looking heavy, and I have lost my mind, that I should do the right thing by everybody, and I should just retire … Yeah, I might be much older, so much older than you, but I’ve still got the power in my brain, in my body. I’ll take no s**t from you.”
Manson has made no secret about how exasperated she gets when the media focus on her age. Is she weary of talking about it?
“I can’t say I am, actually. Indeed, I very much like talking about getting older, because I feel there’s so little out there that focuses on the positivity of ageing.”
In fact Chinese Fire Horse was inspired by a question about her age that somebody asked on the first day of promoting Garbage’s album No Gods No Masters, in 2021. She was 54 then and is 58 now. The absurdity of such questions is that the three men in the band are 74 (Erikson), 66 (Marker) and 69 (Vig).
“I can guarantee you not one member of the band has ever been asked such a question,” she says, her voice seething. “So, yeah, I was offended, and I also realised how ludicrous it was. I’m really tired of our culture telling women that, basically, by the time they’re past their 20s they have no agency.
“For the first time in the history of the music industry we’re finally seeing women enjoying vigorous careers, with full agency, into their 70s and 80s. By that I mean the likes of Patti Smith, Stevie Nicks, Debbie Harry, Chrissy Hynde, Chaka Khan, Lucinda Williams, Dolly Parton and many more. That is a brand new thing worthy of our attention and our respect.
“I speak about this experience that I endured because I want women, all women – and men, for that matter – to know, because I think it applies to all of us.
“My concern, however, is always for women, because I feel there’s so little encouragement for women in society about ageing. I want women to know they have agency in their 70s and 80s, and don’t let anyone ever tell them otherwise.
[ Garbage in Dublin: Manson emerges on stage, an absolute badassOpens in new window ]
“That’s why I wrote that song, those words, and that’s why I feel this way. It’s important for women to understand they’re equally as potent as their male counterparts.
“I don’t think Chinese Fire Horse is an angry song; it’s a song born of outrage. I’m fed up being labelled angry just because I’m willing to speak out about things like this. I’m not angry: I’m outraged.” She takes a breath. “There’s a big, big difference.”
Over the past 10 years Manson has brought more women to work with the band on touring, management, merchandise and other areas. Doing so, she says, lessens her sense of loneliness in once doggedly male surroundings.
“I decided I wanted to see a change from something I’ve found myself in for the majority of my 45-year career. I love men. I have a lot of respect for most of the people that I have worked with over the years, but I needed some female energy. I got to the point when it was unsustainable for me to remain in an entirely male environment.”
Let All That We Imagine Be the Light is released via BMG on Friday, May 30th
