Listening to Garbage’s cover of The Cure’s “Lovesong” on stage in Utrecht yesterday (see the beautiful on concertandvinyl Insta), I suddenly realised that Shirley Manson may actually be the goth rock queen.
The funny thing is that the clues had been there all along.
Since their debut album, there have always been hints of it. Isn’t Garbage’s most famous anthem, “Only Happy When It Rains”, goth in its own way? Maybe not musically in the traditional goth rock sense, but certainly in spirit. The song openly celebrates melancholy, pessimism and emotional darkness, themes that have always been at the heart of goth culture.
Despite a more pop-oriented turn afterwards, there was always something undeniably dark and mysterious about both Garbage and Shirley Manson in particular. Unlike many female rock stars of the 1990s, Shirley never projected sunshine or glamour. Her image was colder, darker, more elegant and more mysterious.
“You Look So Fine”, my personal favourite from Version 2.0, now feels even more significant. Looking back, it is remarkably close to a goth anthem. The piano, the dramatic chord progression, the romantic fatalism and the slow emotional build all evoke the same beautiful sadness found on many goth and post-punk records over the last forty years. At times, it even feels closer to The Cure’s “Disintegration” than to most alternative rock records of the late 1990s.
Then, if you jump to Garbage’s two most recent albums, both widely considered among the strongest records of their career, the goth connection becomes even more obvious.
On the latest album, songs such as “Have We Met (The Void)” feature heavy bass lines, dark keyboards, atmospheric piano and lyrics filled with existential unease. The song would not feel out of place on many modern darkwave or post-punk records.
And what about “The Day That I Met God”? The title alone sounds goth. It immediately brings to mind the fascination with religion, spirituality, guilt and symbolism found throughout the history of goth rock, from Christian Death’s “Only Theatre of Pain” onwards.
On the previous album, “No Gods No Masters”, even the title points in that direction, we find “The Creeps”, another song that sits comfortably within goth and darkwave territory. And I almost forgot the Patti Smith cover of “No Horses“. If there is one Garbage song that fully embraces goth aesthetics, this might be it. The apocalyptic lyrics, the sense of impending collapse, Shirley Manson’s dramatic vocal delivery, the dark electronic atmosphere and the almost funereal mood throughout the song all place it very close to the territory explored by goth, darkwave and post-punk bands.
Then we come back to that cover of “Lovesong” in Utrecht.
For me, this was the moment everything suddenly clicked into place.
Shirley’s voice was pure and effortless. The entire band was dressed in black. Shirley wore a black Scottish kilt adorned with chains, towering black boots and carried herself with the confidence of a warrior queen. Her platinum-blond hair contrasted against the darkness, making her look almost like a Viking warrior emerging from some gothic fantasy.
And what is more goth than performing one of the defining songs from The Cure’s catalogue?
Yes, Robert Smith has spent decades rejecting the goth label. Yet “Disintegration” remains one of the most influential albums in goth culture.
And if I needed one final piece of evidence, there is this: The Cure invited Garbage to perform as part of their Teenage Cancer Trust concerts at the Royal Albert Hall recently. Robert Smith has always been selective about the artists he champions, and Garbage’s presence there feels less like a coincidence and more like an acknowledgement of a shared emotional territory.
So now I finally understand why I have loved Garbage for the last thirty years.
The revelation in Utrecht was not that Garbage had suddenly become goth.
The revelation was that they may have always been goth-adjacent, carrying the spirit of goth, post-punk, dark romanticism and melancholy beneath the surface of alternative rock.
And Shirley Manson may well be the closest thing the last thirty years of alternative rock have produced to a modern goth rock queen.
This concert was a revelation.
If Garbage comes your way, do not miss them.
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