Garbage The Well Rounded Interview

And it really has little to do with the actual commercial success of the band -- it's to do with the fact that these three men encouraged me wholeheartedly to write music. Up to that point I had always been too frightened to bring any ideas to anybody and they were openly encouraging me to do so. They almost forced me, in some ways, to start writing, and they encouraged me to play the guitar and they really pushed me as a person and I have responded to that. I have found a way of articulating some of my thoughts and feelings and frustrations. I feel amazing because of it. I feel empowered.

Isn't it kind of ironic, though, that you had to ditch the people who were most like you, and go found people that were, on paper anyways, seemingly incompatible with you, in order to feel more comfortable?

Absolutely. But there's a lesson to be learned there for everybody. Again, I go back to the fact that my life was in such a downbeat mess, I was forced into taking chances. I think if you play it safe in life and stick to things that aren't quite right for you then you will never be ultimately satisfied. I think you have to take risks in life and be frightened-- because its good for you.

You talked about the guys really encouraging you to write more and contribute more, do you feel, that, consequently, the new album has more of you in it?

I don't think it has more of me in it necessarily because a lot of people underestimate the input I had on the first record. So on this record I don't think there's more of me, but I think it's more personal, just because I have a little more confidence as a songwriter. I was able to be a little more up front and confrontational than I had been on the first record which I felt was very veiled.

It's been well-documented that growing up you had a lot of problems with your self-image and your self-confidence. Was getting on stage, even before Garbage, a way of dealing with that?

Woa. Uh, it's hard to say. I started as a teenager involved in dramatics--I was in a theatre group--so absolutely, that was total escapism. But then, I fell into a band by default. When I first went on stage it wasn't so much an escape as I felt I could accept myself on stage, if that makes any sense. I felt that it, uh, it illuminated myself. I don't know--when I walked on stage I felt comfortable and then I would walk back off stage and I would feel like my usual self.

Your success in Garbage, both commercially as well as socially, seems to have improved your self-image, though.

Umm, well....

Or maybe not?

"I'm not a sort of shy and tiring little flower. That's not who I am. I try to be polite and sweet when I meet people that I have no truck with, but if somebody fucks with me I'm gonna fuck with them back."

I think as a human being, it has definitely improved my confidence. I feel that I have achieved certain things in my life. I feel that has empowered me as a human being. I think that my self-image is still problematic for me but I've accepted that that's something I'll probably deal with until I drop. Because when peole are focusing a lot of attention on you, it can become very intimidating and you can become very self-aware. And if you're not comfortable with yourself, with your body or your face or yourself as a human, when you're under the magnifying glass it gets even more uncomfortable. Like being put in a sweatbox. Which is ironic because it seems like kind of a contradiction but that's how it feels in some ways.

So would you say, ultimately that you like the attention, or if given the choice you'd probably prefer not to have it?

I think there must be some kind of sad, innate flaw in me that needs it. I think any performer though, in some way, once they have decided to sign a record deal, is consciously, or subconsciously looking for attention.

I guess its strange, because the image, and when I say that I realize that images are often manufactured by the media and by record labels and managers and whoever else, but the image that you portray, whether it's in a photo shoot or a video or on stage, is a very brash and bold. Do you feel like this image contradicts what's going on underneath?

I don't know. I've had a lot of people sort of accusing me--because I seem one way or another--that one side of me is manufactured. And I think that's a ludicrous and myopic way of looking at human beings. I think I am a contradictory person. I think almost everybody I know has got different elements inside of them and they come out at different times. I can be brash and bold, but I can also be sweet as pie. It depends on my mood. It depends on the person I'm sparring with or conversing with. I'm not a sort of shy and tiring little flower. That's not who I am. I'm not that kind of person. I try to be polite and sweet when I meet people that I have no truck with, but if somebody fucks with me I'm gonna fuck with them back. I find it that the world can't accept that a woman can be two things.

While I'd agree that if the music didn't catch people, it wouldn't matter what the image was, but I don't think you can deny that people are attracted to the image of Garbage.

Sure.

Does that bother you at all that you have to put together the whole package as opposed to the music just standing on its own?

No, not at all. For me personally, and I think it's different for each individual in any band, but for me, the `whole package,' is part of the joy of being in a band. We get great satisfaction from over looking our artwork and our videos. I've always been into pop stars too. I've never really held with the whole American idea of a rock star. A lot of American rock stars want to play down the fact that they're in a rock band, whereas where I come from in the UK, we were always into big pop stars.

I always wanted my pop stars to look like they didn't exist in real life. I wanted them to be larger than life in some ways. And the fascination that I had with my idols has rubbed off in the way that I approach our band and how we approach the side of ourselves that stands with our music. I'm not being very articulate here. I think we pride ourselves on the fact that we are really pedantic over who we have work with the band, how we portray ourselves in videos, how we do special packaging for all our seven-inches and our mini-discs. I think that's part of the fun of being in a band and making records.

I mean, why spend an age in a studio and then shove out your record in a paper sleeve, with stenciled typeface? We're not interested in doing that. Again, it's weird. I certainly never wanted to dress like everybody else. I wanted to have things on my person that nobody else had in the world. And make myself be an individual. And I think its the same with our artwork and the same with our videos.We don't want to look like every other band. It's just another way of creating your own individual world.

Did Butch's experiences dealing with Nirvana and Smashing Pumpkins help you guys deal with selling four million records and all the things that came along with it?

Well, yeah, of course it did, but it's wierd because, well, I think collectively we all had an enormous amount of experience. I mean, I had been signed, with other bands, to major labels for years, and failed miserably. I think that was also a great contributing factor to the dangers that faced us as a band. And I think that the combined efforts of Butch and me and Duke and Steve, who had all been in bands before, I think that helped us to avoid the pitfalls that might have struck a less experienced band.

The recording for both of the albums was done entirely in Madison, Wisconsin. How did spending so much time there change you?

(Laughs) Oh, let me count the ways. For some reason, I find it really peculiar that people should get really uptight about an individual's personal experience in a town or a city. And I have encountered great resentment from the Madisonians about things that I've said in the press, which I felt were really just said tongue-in-cheek, to amuse myself and/or the interviewer and/or the reader. I find it strange that people should take it so seriously.

But it drove me crazy, because I don't drive, and if you don't drive somewhere like Madison, you're kind of screwed because everything's sprawled out. I come from Europe, where you have city-centers, where you can walk around for at least a mile in any direction and you'll be surrounded by shops and houses and people and public transport. And it's not the case in the Midwest, or it certainly doesn't seem the case anywhere in America. So being one that cannot drive oneself around it's really pretty difficult. I'm kind of trapped or at the mercy of the people I work with and it drove me nuts.

I became a complete computer fiend. It was literally my lover during the course of making that album. I came home to my hotel room every night and had no one to speak to. And I would just get on the computer.

Will that fact affect the future of the band, or have you accepted the idea of dealing with living in Madison for a few months a year?

I can deal with it but I think we've all agreed that we'd like to try some other places. Before we went into the studio this time, we did some recording in a house just off the west coast of Seattle. I think we all found that really, pretty inspiring. It was a change of pace and I think we appreciated that. So I think we'd like to try some other places. But the great thing about Madison is that it's very quiet and cheap, there's very little else to do other than go into the studio and work. We find that when we're in more exciting metropolises, we tend to get more distracted. So it may well prove that we have to hole ourselves away in that sense.

How has spending so much time with three Americans changed your view of America and Americans?

Well, this sounds incredibly hokey, but I adore America. I love it as a country, I've had nothing but amazing experiences here. It was the first country obviously to really embrace me, in some respects, as a singer. So I have nothing but great things to say about it and have nothing but affection for it.

I get very riled up when I go back to Scotland, because the Europeans have a very sort of bigotted view of the America that is portrayed in the media over there, which is basically fat, gross, ignorant people, who eat lots of hamburgers and have no sense of culture. I mean literally, that is the stereotype that is portrayed in our country. There are a lot of derogatory remarks made about America and I go berserk. The friends that I have made over here are as intellectual and as hilarious as anyone I know over in Scotland. And I think it's a very narrow view of a very complex country.

Has spending a lot of time in America, changed your view of Scotland and Edinborough?

(Somewhat resignedly) Yes, yeah. It's changed my view of the world, full-stop. Obviously when you leave a place for that amount of time, you get a certain perspective that you wouldn't get on it otherwise. On a multitude of levels.

Has working with three men, affected the way you think about men at all?

Working with men, I don't think of them as men and I don't think they think of me as a woman. I think the sexual side, the sexes of our band are totally irrelevant.

In making the new album you used a Beach Boys sample and a Pretenders sample, and both Brian Wilson and Chrissie Hynde gave you a thumbs up to do whatever you wanted with their stuff. Was it reassuring to get the approval of such pop icons?

Oh god, yes. Absolutely. I can rest easier. It's wierd. When you're in a band that reaches a certain level of success, you get not only great accolades but you are attacked viciously by the media. And understandably, I'm not complaining, I'm just stating a fact. But you can get really cuttting criticism leveled at you and strangely enough all the accolades kind of disappear from view very quickly. Its like a little fix and then it disappears almost as quick as it came upon you. But the criticism can cut very deeply at times, and it can sort of haunt you. You kind of mull it over in your mind and think, "am I really what that person says I am?" and it goes around your head. And when you are complimented by people that you admire and love and respect, then it's a touchstone that you can fall back on and think, "The people that I feel connected to, feel some kind of small connection with me." There's a mild communion. And I think as a musician that's what you're always looking for. Making music is a call out to whoever's listening, who feels the same way as you do, or has experienced the same things as you have. I'm gabbling a little bit...

There's been so much made in the music industry and the press in the last few years about the "electronic music revolution," and many people felt that Garbage was a band who could bridge the gap between more electronic, experimental sounds, and simpler pop music. Was that something the band aspired to at all?

It was placed upon us and others. We came out around about a time when very few acts were doing what we were doing, i.e., mixing sort of traditional elements of alternative-rock and pop with electronica and sampling and hip-hop and techno and drum `n bass. So I think we just got lucky. I think we caught a wave and we resounded with a lot of musicians at the time who then went back and rethought their approach to recording. But I don't know if it was anything we aspired to do. We certainly don't want any kind of responsibility leveled at us for anything. We're not flagbearers at all.

It's interesting, like you said, you sort of `caught a wave,' when the first album came out, and with the sampling and electronic things that Garbage does, it can't help but sound very, uh, current. Are you worried about being too current or too trendy and that the stuff you're doing might not have a lasting impact?

No, I can't say we are particuarly worried at all, because I think as a band we concentrate on writing the songs first. We're obsessed with pop songs. We try to write pop songs and we're obsessed with melody and hooks. We try to make sure that the song stands on its own, even if you took away all of the frills and the toppings which is basically the sounds and the samples and the loops. That, to us, is all the trimming. But we all feel that we could strip the songs down to acoustic guitar and they would stand up on their own.

We've done that already actually. We do it every now and again live. I think the great thing about Garbage is that we feel like we haven't restricted ourselves in anyway musically. The door is open for us to do anything and no matter what direction we go in, our fans will still feel its true to how we are as a band. I think a lot of bands couldn't really make a transition without it seeming a little phony, but I think because of the way we approach music, which is very loose, it would seem perfectly natural.

Well, I've taken up enough of your time...

Have I spoken to you before, David?

I don't think so.

Where are you from?

I'm from Atlanta.

You have a lovely accent.

Thanks. And you do as well. But yours sounds a little more exotic down here.

Well, yeah I suppose. But put you in Scotland and you'd sound pretty damn exotic.

Yeah, that was one of the more exciting things about going to Europe I finally got to have an accent that I could, well,...

You finally got laid. (Laughs)

David Peisner