Garbage frontwoman freaks out male fans

TORONTO – Garbage’s formidable frontwoman Shirley Manson sits on a chair in a Toronto hotel room yesterday wearing a tiny red T-shirt that says, “Redheads have more fun.”
The striking 38-year-old Edinburgh native with intense green eyes who packs a sexy wallop on stage claims her groupies are never of the male variety.
“I get female groupies, but I don’t get male groupies,” says Manson in her thick Scottish accent that makes her all the more attractive. “I have women who offer to sleep with me all the time. But not men. They’re all talk and nay action — as we’d say in Scotland. If I go anywhere near most of our male following, they are freaked. Absolutely freaked. I think my height has got a lot to do with it. I’m really tall. I’m five-eight, and with heels, I’m six foot, so people are like. ‘Whoa, Amazon!’ People are a wee taken aback by that ’cause I think people expect me to be small.”

Manson, who projects ferocious confidence as a performer, has been assigned the same prestigious league that includes Debbie Harry, Chrissie Hynde, and Patti Smith.
In fact, she says those three are among her idols and she’s met them all and not been disappointed. “I don’t really see where I fit into that group, but I’m very flattered,” says Manson, dressed in black shorts with a red tartan belt, black stockings and black boots. “I think, though, all of us women, regardless of how different we are as artists, come from a similar place in terms of how we view our role as a female musician. All of us are pretty feisty. And I think that that’s what people identify with. Because there seem to be so few women right now who are interested in having an opinion. Having something to say. Trying to do things a little differently. Refusing to take our clothes off to further our careers.”
As mighty as she comes across, Manson had a major scare a few years ago when she lost her voice while Garbage was headlining summer festivals in Europe. She eventually had surgery in June 2003 to remove a cyst from her right vocal chord.
“It’s not common, but yeah, I was scared. When you’re really up against the possibility of losing your livelihood, you just have to think positively. For once in my life, I thought very positively. And I thought, ‘I can do this.’ ”
Manson maintains that her strength, off-stage and on, hasn’t always been there.
“No, no, definitely not. But that said, I’m suddenly looking back at my career. You know, I’ve been doing this for 23 years. Since I was 15 I’ve been playing shows and I’m not at all frightened of it. And too, just because the band has really been through great highs, great lows together, I don’t think we feel that we’ve got anything to hide.”
Garbage have triumphantly returned with their well-received, hard-rocking and loud fourth album, Bleed Like Me, which debuted at No. 4 in the U.S. and No. 9 in Canada. But beforehand, they had almost called it quits.
In fact, Manson and guitarist Steve Marker, who was at her side, say drummer/producing guru Butch Vig actually did leave the band at one point after nine creatively frustrating months in their Madison, Wis., recording studio.
“The communication had gotten so bad that I don’t think any of us know, even to this day, what was going on in each individual’s mind,” says Manson. “And we’ve never really spoken about it. But I do know that Butch felt that he quit.”
There had been some major physical problems too. Garbage was opening for U2 in 2001 when Vig was diagnosed with the non-life-threatening Type A hepatitis, so the band continued on with replacement drummers. He would also be later diagnosed with Bells Palsy, a facial paralysis that was successfully treated eventually.
“He’s Mr. Consistent, he’s always the same, neither up nor down; he’s a real sweetheart,” says Manson. But of Marker and fellow guitarist Duke Erikson, she says, “The three of us are up and down like a bride’s nightie. He’s very solid. And for him to be the one that really fell by the wayside was unbelievably shocking to all of us. It disturbed our equilibrium. It actually has been a very good thing in some respects. We had to pull the cart. And I think it was a good for Butch to realize the cart could be pulled without him.”
[source: jam.canoe.ca]