Garbage makes 34th of Spin's top 40

By Jane Dark

In the summer of '95, Butch Vig built a bridge between distorto-rock and electronic swing. Shirley Manson shimmied across it, promising to tear our little world apart. She was only happy when it rained. But three years have passed and the bridge is now sagging with wannabes like Transister and Sneaker Pimps. Meanwhile, Manson has morphed from hired glamour-gun into a piss-taking fixture on the icon circuit. So it's anyone's guess what will happen with the upcoming Version 2.0, the product of more than a year in the studio. Half the Western world seems to drip into the obsessive crew's strange brew: While Manson now grooves to Photek and Sleater-Kinney, Vig handcrafts shadow samples that could be Chrissie Hynde or Brian Wilson...but aren't. Think of Garbage as houseboys'n'girl of a Disco Versailles, maniacally polishing every surface as they boogie through the palace. Will they emerge to find themselves overtaken by pop-cult amnesia? "I'm sure there are millions who've forgotten us, but it's not something we worry about," says Manson. And if Version 2.0 is a Hall of Mirrors, a slated 18-month tour should haul her theory-funking crew back into the light.